Hamilton 1-0 Dundee

Mar 16 2008 Alan Mcmillan At New Douglas Park

Reid's Men Close In On Title Dream

BILLY REID hailed his Hamilton heroes after watching them put the club firmly in the driving seat for promotion to the SPL.

The delighted Accies' boss saw midfielder James McArthur grab his fifth goal of the season to settle a tense match that had one sending off and nine bookings.

French striker Mickael Antoine-Curier picked up his second yellow card of the game eight minutes into the second half and with Dundee already a goal behind it proved too big a handicap to overcome.

Hamilton are now six points clear of their title rivals although Dundee have a game in hand.

The league leaders have six matches left and the future looks bright. But Reid knows nothing has been decided yet and even gagged his players from speaking after the match in case they said something that might jinx the club.

The Accies' gaffer said: "The game was a bit scrappy but we played well in the first 30 minutes and got the goal that eventually gave us the points.

"I thought we deserved to win but Dundee kept pushing us hard even when they went down to 10 men.

"It has been a big week for us because we've picked up seven points out of nine from two home games and one away.

"But we're taking nothing for granted because we still have St Johnstone to play here and we go to Dundee on the final day.

"I thought our discipline was also good, as it has been all season. We've only had one sent off in all our games and that's a fantastic record."

Discipline was one of the key issues in the match.

As well as having Antoine-Curier sent off for dissent and a gesture to one of the linesmen in protest against a free-kick decision, Dundee picked up all five other bookings.

Dens boss Alex Rae wasn't happy about the dismissal of his on-loan Hibs star who has been banging in the goals lately.

Rae said: "He was sent off for a gesture to the linesman.

"His gesture was basically saying 'that was never a free-kick'. The fact he doesn't speak good English didn't help.

"He hasn't committed a foul yet he's sitting up in the stand. The two linesmen played a much bigger part in the game than the officials on the sidelines usually do.

"But the sending off didn't cost us the game. That was down to us not picking up at a free-kick.

"There wasn't a great deal between the teams and although this wasn't the result we wanted nothing is over. If we can get the three points from our game in hand we know Hamilton have still to come to our place."

The Dens Park outfit had a large and very vocal travelling support but they were silenced when Hamilton scored after 18 minutes following a foul by Patrick Noubissie on Mark Gilhaney.

Tony Stevenson's delivery was headed goalwards by David Graham with keeper Craig Samson doing well to push it away but McArthur followed up to lash in the loose ball.

Colin McMenamin wasted a couple of good chances as Dundee hit back but the home side handled the aerial bombardment well.

Referee Mike Tumilty's decision to order off Antoine-Curier left Dundee to play with 10 men for 37 minutes.

Despite being a man down they kept pushing forward and Tomas Cerny pulled off an excellent save to deny Kevin McDonald.

Dundee suffered another setback in the 66th minute when injured central defender Gary McKenzie had to be replaced by David Worrell.

Rae (below) sent on striker Derek Lyle - who has signed a pre-contract to play for Hamilton next season - for David O'Brien to see if he might be able to come up with something to upset his future employers.

But most of the action was around the other goal with Simon Mensing, Gilhaney and Brian Easton all going close.

Gilhaney looked as if he was about to make it it 2-0 near the end after a poor passback by David Cowan had put him through on goal but Samson raced from his line to deny the little attacker.

MoM: McArthur (Hamilton)