KILMARNOCK STILL FEELING THE HEAT AFTER A CALAMITY AT CALEY
FURIOUS Kilmarnock boss Lee Clark warned Conrad Balatoni he must cut out the errors after his clumsy passback sparked a nightmare collapse in the Highlands. It saw keeper Jamie MacDonald red carded after he was forced to bring down the advancing Ross Draper, with Greg Tansey’s spot-kick cancelling out Kallum Higginbotham’s first-half opener. Two further Caley Thistle goals in a 3-1 victory all but assured Inverness of Premiership safety but plunged the visitors into peril above Dundee United in the play-off position. Clark, unable to hide his disgust at the twisting turn of events, said: ‘We got ourselves into a great position and threw it away. ‘What did Conrad say after the game? There’s nothing he can say because it’s something that’s been talked about before. ‘Hopefully, he learns from it but if you keep making the same errors then you have to change the personnel. ‘We talked about it at half-time. It was unnecessary to pass the ball back to the keeper because of where he was on the pitch. ‘It wasn’t as if he was facing the keeper. He should have clipped it up to the striker and turn the Inverness back four. ‘It has a knock-on effect. Jamie’s been the best keeper in the league this season, so it’s a double blow as he’ll be banned now. ‘The red card and penalty changed the game. ‘We had made the better chances in the second half but then we do that, go down to 10 men and lose the game. ‘We have to dust ourselves down, but I have confidence in young (substitute keeper) Conor Brennan because it wasn’t his fault for any of the goals.’ Clark admits his side now probably need four wins from their four final matches to avoid the play-offs, particularly after Hamilton’s win over Dundee United left the Ayrshire side seven points adrift in 11th. ‘We’d been looking at picking up all 15 points but there’s 12 left now and we have to get them. But to do that we have to cut out the errors.’ Despite his delight at capturing three vital points, Inverness boss John Hughes sympathised with keeper MacDonald. ‘Kilmarnock were hit by a triple whammy with the penalty, the sending off and the goal,’ he said. ‘All we had to do then was be patient and take chances. ‘It was a big three points for us. I did detect some trepidation in their game, but sometimes you have to dig out results.’