Burke’s bonanza as 10-man Killie enjoy some home comfort
Ten-man Kilmarnock were a man down for three-quarters of this contest but you’d never have known it as they dominated hapless Hamilton at Rugby Park.
Alex Dyer’s men moved up to seventh place after a second successive home win while Brian Rice’s team drop down to third bottom.
What’s more, there could have been few complaints from the Lanarkshire outfit about the outcome. When Eamonn Brophy saw red, Dyer kept his head and didn’t change his side’s shape.
Their 4-1-3-2 became 4-1-3-1 and that was enough for them to control the tempo. They out-fought and out-thought Hamilton’s 11.
“It was a brilliant win for us,” said Dyer. “Every single player worked hard for us and it was three good points that were well earned, especially after we went down to 10 men.
“The boys never stopped doing what we wanted to do and we got the right result. We’ve been playing like that since we’ve come back.
“There have been certain times where we didn’t get the result, but we still played well and we’ve kept training well. The character in the team was excellent.
“We have some good experienced players in the team and every one of them dug in and worked hard. It would’ve been easy for them to drop their heads but they didn’t – they kept passing the ball and created a lot of chances. We could’ve won the game more comfortably but I’m happy with the three points.”
Accies were without eight unavailable players – four who had tested positive for Covid19 and another four who were injured – and they were under the cosh from the first whistle.
It had been one-way traffic with the hosts piling on the pressure and, while there were only 10 minutes on the clock when the opening goal arrived, it was already overdue.
Veteran winger Chris Burke had been tormenting the visitors with his close control and he was the man who did all the spade work when the deadlock was broken, jinking past three defenders in a tight space on the edge of the penalty area.
He was brought down by Hakeem Odoffin before he could burst into the box, but midfielder Greg Kiltie reacted quickest, drilling home the loose ball from 15 yards before referee Nick Walsh could blow for the foul.
The visitors could have buckled but falling behind acted as a wake-up call and they drew level just eight minutes later.
Marios Ogkmpoe’s bullet header from David Templeton’s corner was cleared off the line but Odoffin lashed home the rebound from point-blank range.
The pendulum then swung further in Accies favour when Killie went a man down following Eamonn Brophy’s lunge at fullback Scott McMann.
“The red card was a strange one because I don’t think Brophy went to hurt their lad but it was a little bit high,” said Dyer. “If he had got a yellow I would have said fair enough but the ref gave a red and we had to move on, which we did.
“We went down to 10 men and it didn’t affect us too much.”
In fact, the red card seemed to fire Killie up and Nicke Kabamba squandered a great opening by falling over the ball after being sent clear by Burke’s defencesplitting pass.
Hamilton couldn’t make their numerical advantage count and Odoffin had to nod a Kabamba header from Burke’s cross off the line in the 54th minute.
It was no surprise when Killie regained the lead. Ryan Fulton could only parry a piledriver from Gary Dicker and Kabamba drove home from eight yards.