Killie urged to keep up winning mentality
FRASERBURGH 1 Butcher (69) KILMARNOCK 3
Aitken (og 7), Murray (17), Lafferty (70)
Tony Docherty insisted that Kilmarnock must carry forward a winning mentality following a straightforward victory over Fraserburgh to kick-start their Premier Sports Cup campaign.
The Ayrshire side took an early lead at Bellslea Park through a Ross Aitken own goal, while Fraser Murray and Kyle Lafferty also got on the scoresheet. Sean Butcher scored for the hosts, who won last season’s Highland League Championship and put up a decent showing against their full-time visitors.
Docherty, the Killie assistant manager, said: “It’s important to build momentum and that’s off the back of the pre-season games as well. We went through that undefeated, we drew just one game, and it was important to keep that going.
“We’re always looking for better and we didn’t want to concede a goal today. We’ll look at that and analyse it and see how we could have done better to prevent that.
“But, on the other side, we could have scored five or six and maybe we would have done a little bit later on in the season when we’re a bit more clinical and polished in terms of our execution.
“But the important thing is getting the momentum and we take the win from today and we look at the next game against Partick Thistle.”
Killie were clearly intent to get this game wrapped up as quickly as possible and Paul Leask made a good save inside the opening two minutes to deny Oli Shaw the opener after Lafferty had nodded the ball down to him in the box.
However, the fans who had made
the 215-mile journey to northern Aberdeenshire didn’t have to wait long to see their side score and an Aitken own goal saw the visitors take the lead after seven minutes. Rory Mckenzie swung in a delivery from the right flank towards Shaw, who put enough pressure on the home defender to force him into a mistake, although the striker did run away celebrating as if he got the final touch.
Murray added a second in the 17th minute with a free-kick from 25 yards. Leask showed him far too much space to his right side and the winger didn’t need a second invitation to curl his effort over the wall and into the bottom corner.
Leask then made two good saves to deny Danny Armstrong and Lafferty from
adding a third for Killie before the break.
Fraserburgh showed some promise after half-time and thought they had got back into proceedings when Sean Butcher scored in the 69th minute with a scrappy finish from close.
Although it was a deserved strike, Kilmarnock quickly re-established their two-goal lead when Lafferty headed home a minute later from close range at the other end.
Fraserburgh manager Mark Cowie was left disappointed that his side failed to build on the goal they scored.
He said: “That’s probably the worst bit. If we’d kept them at bay for 10, 15 minutes longer, it doesn’t matter how good you’re are, then you maybe start getting edgy in the final minutes.”