St Mirren 3 Accies 0: Tennents Scottish Cup Round 3: 8 January 2005

Tennents Scottish Cup Round 3

St Mirren Park, Paisley, 8 January 2005

Report by Gilbert Mowat

Accies poor form in the Scottish Cup continued when they were easily dismissed by a St Mirren side that controlled the game from start to finish. It was a bleak, cold, wet and windy day at Love St and the game did nothing to cheer up the reasonable Accies support. The first half was dominated by the home team, although they didn't really look like scoring until Derek Ferguson had to limp off after about 20 minutes. Unfortunately, it seems that this player's Accies career will be remembered for the number of times he has had to be substituted in the first half.

Ferguson was replaced by Chris Aitken, but the midfield (now consisting of Aitken, David Carney, Andy Arbuckle and Pat Keogh) were overrun by their superior opponents for much of the game. It was no real shock when St Mirren took the lead after 24 minutes, with new signing Stewart Keane making a good run to the near post and flicking home a cross from the wing from close range. The home team nearly extended their lead shortly afterwards with a low shot that scraped the post and it was hard to see how Accies would get back into the game. They did manage the occasional sporadic attack in the first period but there was never a time when a goal looked likely.

Allan Maitland made another change at the interval, with the anonymous Andy Arbuckle being replaced by Brian Carrigan. This made an immediate improvement in the quality of the football Accies played. They did compete much better after the break and Carrots linked well with Brian McPhee and the impressive Mark Corcoran. But still the midfield underperformed. Pat Keogh and David Carney had poor games and it sadly looks like Chris Aitken is not a Division 1 player. If the management have ambitions about maintaining our status in the second top league, they had better push the boat out and improve the player pool quickly.

Accies did have a few "half chances" in the second half, with Carrots firing over a couple of superb crosses from the right that had the Saints defence in disarray. Mark Corcoran had a decent shot at goal following a rare defensive error by Kevin McGowne, but his shot missed by inches. With Accies having to be more attack minded as the game wore on, gaps appeared in the defence and the home team eventually got the extra goals they deserved, with Allan Russell and Stewart Keane scoring within a couple of minutes of each other near the end. By that stage, Accies were down to 10 men as Mark Corcoran had limped off. All three substitutes had been committed as Paul McLeod had replaced Iain Fyfe just a few minutes earlier.

So that was really that. Brian McPhee was yellow carded for pushing over Andy Millen and Brian Carrigan got one for a foul. But it was not a dirty game and it was quite well handled by the referee.

For those Accies fans like myself who have never even seen the club contest a quarter final, this was a very disappointing game. I would give pass marks to very few of the team for this performance. The stand out player was Sandy Hodge in the middle of the defence who had an excellent game. The general malaise even had an effect on the normally excellent Dave McEwan, whose handling and kicking were very poor. But I'm not picking him out, there were too many failures in the bright yellow shirts to mention.

The good news is that we can concentrate on the league and our battle to avoid the drop. (But of course that kind of comment normally only comes from those whose team has been gubbed in the cup!)

A decent run in the cup would have been great for the club, let's hope this result does not have too much effect on the morale of the squad and that it was just a bad day at the office.

St Mirren: Hinchcliffe, van Zanten, Millen, McGowne, Broadfoot, Reilly, Murray (Crilly 72), McCay, Lappin, Kean (Baird 89), McGinty (Russell 62). Subs Not Used: O'Neil, Woods.

Goals: Kean 24, Russell 77, Kean 80.

Hamilton: McEwan, Fyfe (McLeod 74), Thomson, Hodge, Arbuckle (Carrigan 46), Walker, Ferguson (Aitken 22), Keogh, Carney, McPhee, Corcoran. Subs Not Used: Lumsden, Jellema.

Booked: McPhee, Carrigan.

Att: 2,700

Ref: M Ritchie

©AcciesWorld 2005

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