Accies had to content themselves with a 3-3 draw against Rangers in an exciting Cup-tie at New Douglas Park and face a replay at Ibrox next week. It’ll be the third game between the sides in ten days as we also meet in Hamilton, in the League, this Saturday.
I expect us to go one better in that game and finally beat one of the Old Firm. We were easily the better team yesterday having statistically more possession, more shots and definitely more composure, playing our passing game.
Rangers have a very good counter-attack in Boyd and Miller so are always a threat. But they will be missing McCulloch and Miller through suspension next Saturday blunting their attacking options. If Boyd and Novo don’t recover from injury, they’ll not have any decent forwards left with only Lafferty to lead the line.
Defensively, they looked hopeless without Bougherra. Weir is showing his age and struggled to cope with Antoine-Curier, his slip allowing him through to coolly put Accies into the lead right on halftime.
What a moment for the Accies support, after having been two down through sloppy defending, to come back to three-two with three goals in nine minutes. It can’t be often the Rangers are glad to hear the half-time whistle when playing in Scotland.
The talk at half time was “how would we approach the second half”; defend or keep on attacking? We still managed to attack, but Rangers came out determined and forced an equaliser through a very soft penalty.
The ball was played against Elliott’s arm while he was lying on the ground. He even tried to move his arm out of the way but the referee gave it. It would never have been given at the other end and wouldn’t have been a foul, just a play on, if it had happened anywhere else on the pitch. It’s the second game in a row where we’ve suffered from an accidental handball incident against the Old Firm which has affected the result, following the disallowed equaliser at Parkhead on Boxing Day.
After equalising, the Rangers fans sang (without a hint of irony) “That’s why we’re Champions”. We know!
Still the replay will bring in some extra revenue, which is a bonus, although with three SPL games postponed over Christmas, it’s not helping our fixture backlog. The tie’s not over, but I doubt we’ll win at Ibrox.
If I were the manager I’d send out the under 19’s for some experience and save our first team squad for the more important SPL games. With our Under 19’s sitting top of the Under 19 League who knows they might pull off a shock.
The crowd at the game was disappointing, with less than 4,000 attending. The weather leading up to the game, with the doubts over whether it would be on, must have affected ticket sales as does the recession, post-Christmas bills and the game being live on television, but for those who did make the effort it was an exciting, memorable game and well worth braving the cold. Hopefully a better crowd will be there next week to witness an equally good match.
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