PERFECT NICKE
Dyer salutes Kabamba as Brophy starts scoring again
KILMARNOCK manager Alex Dyer last night paid tribute to recent signing Nicke Kabamba for breathing new life into struggling strike partner Eamonn Brophy.
Scotland striker Brophy scored a beautiful goal from open play and another from the penalty spot to overturn Iain Vigurs’ first-half opener for County.
And that set the scene nicely for Kabamba to wrap up the three points with his third goal in four games since arriving from Hartlepool on an 18-month deal.
Dyer ripped up a tried-and-tested system to field both players up front as a partnership and believes it is already beginning to bear fruit.
Brophy’s 12 goals last season earned him that Scotland cap, but yesterday’s brace is the first time he has scored two in a game this term and took his tally for the campaign to just six.
More importantly for Dyer, it ended a seven-game losing streak in the Premiership and a run of nine league fixtures without a win, putting Killie within four points of sixth-placed Hibs in the table.
‘It is great the two strikers scored, but that’s why they are here,’ said the manager. ‘I brought Nicke in to play alongside Eamonn as it helps him. When he is playing well, we are a better side and he needed help up there.
‘Nicke has given him that help and has been excellent since he walked through the door. We could have had more goals, but I am happy with what we got. We showed good character, every single player, after going a goal down.
‘We didn’t panic at half-time. The heads can drop, but we dug in and kept doing what we were doing and we asked questions of them.
‘I hope that is the turning point for us, but you never know. It was a good victory and one we deserved.’
That Kilmarnock went in a goal behind at the break was a quite remarkable statistic.
They started very much on top and had Ross County penned in for huge chunks of the game.
Kabamba flashed a header just over the crossbar at the beginning, with the home side feeling they could have been given a penalty after just four minutes.
A snapshot from Brophy squirmed out of the grasp of grounded County goalkeeper Nathan Baxter and looked like it might end up spinning into the goal until Ricky Foster appeared on the scene to clear.
The ball was put straight back into the area from Chris Burke and the hosts’ shouts for a penalty after Rory McKenzie went down at the back post were loud and long — but completely ignored by referee
Willie Collum. That the visitors’ opener came very much against the run of play was undeniable.
However, any sense of injustice from Killmarnock could only ever receive a limited degree of sympathy due to the fact they sold the jerseys in the run-up to Vigurs’ sharp finish.
Niko Hamalainen lost possession from a throw-out by keeper Lary Branescu and County midfielder Josh Mullin put a cross into the heart of the danger zone.
The ball was poorly cleared to Vigurs on the edge of the box and his left-footed volley beat Branescu all ends up to his right.
Pressure by the Highlanders in the early part of the second had resulted in a build-up of tension among the home support around Rugby Park, but that disappeared in fine style after 54 minutes.
Killie’s Irish midfielder Alan Power got the better of Vigurs in a challenge and played a pass out wide to Brophy on the right.
The striker took a touch, cut inside past a defender and let go a great right-footed shot from around 22 yards that zipped into the top of the net off keeper Baxter’s outstretched hand.
And just four minutes later, Killie had a penalty-kick.
Coll Donaldson was adjudged to have upended Burke in the area and Brophy stepped up to coolly send an effort straight down the middle and into the net after Baxter had committed himself and dived to his right.
‘At their second goal, Burke is offside in the lead-up,’ said County co-manager Stuart Kettlewell.
‘He is two yards away from the linesman (Craig Ferguson) and we need the officials to get those decisions right.’
For all that, Kilmarnock won easily in the end. With quarter of an hour left, Dario del Fabro produced a superb glancing header from a Burke corner from the right.
It looked sure to land in the net until Baxter threw himself to his right and tipped it over the crossbar with his right hand in the most sensational, acrobatic fashion.
However, Kabamba did give the scoreline a more appropriate feel eight minutes from the end when he sent a header from a Burke free-kick looping into the corner.
‘We warned the players about the pitfalls of coming out in the second half, being slack and not joined up. — I think we saw that,’ declared Kettlewell. ‘It is really, really frustrating.
‘I thought that the nature of the goals we conceded flashes a sign of a soft centre and of us going under a wee bit. We felt we accepted our fate a little bit at 2-1.’