Rice delighted to blend youth and experience
Brian Rice saluted his young players who are learning their trade on the job.
The Accies boss lavished praise on 18-year-old defender Jamie Hamilton for his part in keeping a clean sheet against United. Rice believes Accies are improving their performances at the back, but admits they need to be better in attack. He said: “I thought Jamie Hamilton was absolutely outstanding. For an 18-year-old to play like that in the Premier League was terrific. “The experience of Brian Easton coming back into the side alongside him also helped us. “It’s another clean sheet and we’re delighted with that.
“When experienced boys go out, it has to be the young boys that come in. I thought they did all right last week but you could see the difference it made with Brian and Aaron Martin returning. “When you look through our team, there’s probably only 100 Premiership appearance between half-a-dozen of them.
“They’re learning on the job. That’s the way it works at a community club like Hamilton and it has been successful.” Rice admitted that 21-year-old Callum Smith should have at least got a first-half chance on target.
He said: “Callum needs to do better than that and he knows it. He has to show more composure. He has to learn.
“The strikers have not scored enough goals this season. I know that and I’m trying to address it. But it is very difficult.
“We have addressed the situation of losing goals. Now we have to try and address the situation of scoring them.”
Accies are one of the teams caught up in the farce surrounding points being deducted and then wiped-out by the SPFL.
The club got three points awarded and thentakenawaywhenst Mirren appealed against being punished for a breach of protocols.
They will now have to face the Buddies in a re-arranged fixture, a game that could already have been done and dusted if the procedure hadn’t dragged on so long.
With St Mirren playing a League Cup semi-final next weekend, Rice’s men aren’t scheduled to play again until they travel to Celtic Park on January 27.
They were due to play Saints in the Scottish Cup three days later, but that date has been changed for St Mirren to play Celtic in the league.
Rice said: “I don’t know when we will be able to play St Mirren. The fixtures will pile up, but we will need to play them and get on with it.
“The decision has been made, I’m just pleased we got it on a Friday night rather than Saturday morning.”