Accies denied spot kicks in drab stalemate
A WIN would have lifted Kilmarnock into the top half of the table but they were slightly fortunate to take a point from a dour encounter.
Certainly, Hamilton Accies manager Martin Canning was convinced that his side were denied victor y by refereeing decisions on an afternoon when the quality of Scotland’s match officials came in for scrutiny.
The game was 23 minutes old before supporters at freezing cold Rugby Park finally witnessed a save, Killie’ s Jamie MacDonald throwing himself to his right to keep out a piledriver from Rakish Bingham.
Accies created the better chances during the opening 45 minutes.
Ali Crawford twice fired wide from good positions while Bingham wasted a free header from six yards, directing it wide.
Killie’s best chance fell to former Rangers and Scotland striker Kris Boyd but his header from a Jordan Jones cross drifted inches wide of Gary Woods’ right- hand post.
However, Accies were clearly on top and had two decent penalty claims dismissed, one when Dougie Imrie appeared to be pulled back and another when Steven Smith handled.
“I thought Dougie’s was a penalty,” said Canning.
“He’s got no reason to go down unless there’s contact.
“With the one where it has come up and hit Smith on the hand, the referee reckons that it has hit his instep and then hit his hand and that’s why he hasn’t given it.
“Their player, Jonathan Bu r n , then commits exactly the same foul he’d previously been booked for and doesn’t get a second yellow card.
“I don’t think that has anything to do with the end result though, that was because we didn’t finish well enough.”
The second half was a
very different story, though.
The Ayrshire hosts, who had been lacklustre during the opening period, seized the initiative and Gary Woods made two important saves to deny Souleymane Coulibaly.
Boyd deliberately diverted a shot from Adam Frizzell behind Woods but the offside flag was raised against the striker for the umpteenth time.
Woods beat away a netbound drive from Gary Dicker late on.
But the best save came during injury time when the unsighted MacDonald somehow managed to push behind a 25- yard volley from Massimo Donati which had flown through a ruck of players.
“When your goalkeeper has to make a wonder save right at the death, it’s a point gained,” admitted Kilmarnock manager Lee Clark.
“I don’ t think we deserved to lose but we also didn’t deserve to win.
“Probably the best bit of play was when the ball came into my technical area and I killed it for Luke Hendrie.
“Unfortunately, I’m five stone overweight and 10 years too old to play!”