DOUGIE Imrie went from a figure of fun to a match-winner as Hamilton secured only their second win in 16 home league matches.
The attacker was mocked by his own supporters for a wild attempt with a free kick but he recovered to score the all-important goal to earn the victory his side so thoroughly deserved.
Imrie said: “The free-kick was one of those that went very wrong but I scored the winner so that will do. I just lifted the ball over the keeper from close range when I saw him going down. It was good to get the win and the boys deserved it because we were excellent from start to finish.”
County were surprisingly inept, given that they arrived in Hamilton on the back of two consecutive victories, but they were desperately unfortunate not to take the lead just two minutes into the game.
Martin Woods swung over a corner and Andrew Davies got above everyone to power a header past Remi Matthews but the ball thumped off the bar.
Hamilton were quickly in control, however, and were close to breaching the Staggies defence twice on the break. Massimo Donati made a terrific block on Jonathan Franks’ shot on the edge of the box in eight minutes, then sparked a sweeping move towards the County goal.
Darian MacKinnon played in Imrie in the inside left channel but his left-footed shot was well saved by Scott Fox.
The former Partick goalkeeper made an even better save after 14 minutes when he made a great block on Greg Docherty’s right foot with MacKinnon again providing the pass.
Invigorated, Hamilton became more dominant as County struggled to find any rhythm, but it was hardly compulsive viewing for the pitifully low crowd of 1,609.
Docherty was as industrious as ever and nearly caused Fox a problem after 49 minutes when his shot deflected off Chris Routis and nearly looped in. Hamilton thought they had a penalty after 52 minutes when Imrie was bundled to the ground by Michael Gardyne but referee Greg Aitken awarded a free-kick on the 18-yard line instead.
Imrie made a complete hash of the free-kick, ballooning it so high and wide that the ball ended up in one of the portable training goals which raised an ironic cheer.
Imrie redeemed himself with the vital goal 16 minutes from time and you have to say Accies deserved it. He was in the right spot when he drove home a left-footed shot after Docherty had prodded the ball through to him after dispossessing Jay McEveley in midfield.
The irony was that Accies struck just seconds after County had created their first decent opportunity of the second half when Alex Schalk hit a great diagonal ball for Gardyne but Matthews made a terrific save from the winger’s header.
County can have few complaints and it was a bit of wasted journey for Northern Ireland manager Michael O’Neill who was in Lanarkshire to check on the form of Liam Boyce ahead of next week’s World Cup qualifier in the Czech Republic.
To put it mildly, it was a difficult day for the County striker but he was not alone. County were strangely toothless and largely uncreative and manager Jim McIntyre had a few complaints.
He said: “Our quality on the ball was poor and our decision-making let us down.”
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