Hamilton 5 - 1 Ross County: Accies off on the goal trail

AFTER selling-on James McArthur, James McCarthy and Bryan Easton, young Ali Crawford finds himself being lauded, after less than a handful of appearances in the Accies first team as "The Next Big Thing". Only time will tell if he has the X factor of the other three, but, the early signs are good.

He had already caught the eye with some incisive passing and a key part in the Lanarkshire version of Catalonian close-passing, but the way he took Accies' second goal, five minutes before the break, was a definite "wow" moment - opening out his right foot to volley a Dougie Imrie cross past Michael Fraser into the far corner of the net.

Imrie too had an immense first half. After setting-up Mark McLaughlin's brace of goals at Ayr last week, he again played the provider for the home side's opener, in 23 minutes. Fraser had tipped James Chambers' header from an Imrie cross over the bar for a corner. Imrie took it and found the head of Matt Paterson, whose effort was blocked on the line by Gary Miller. The rebound fell to McLaughlin, however, and from six yards the veteran defender drilled the ball home.

Technically this was his "hat trick" goal - three successive strikes, but over two games. That opener had come after an opening period which saw both sides playing attractive passing football, but, on pressure, it was no less than the home side deserved.

The sky fell in on the visitors just before the break. McLaughlin moved forward to deliver a well-judged diagonal pass into the path of Paterson, but the big striker was clearly upended by Jonathan Flynn as he ran onto the ball - an obvious penalty and a straight red card for the County defender, for the DOGSO - denying a goal-scoring opportunity in referee-speak.

The kick was clinically converted by James Chambers and, with Flynn off, County boss Derek Adams had no option but to sacrifice Michael Gardyne and introduce Scott Boyd into central defence.

Things got worse for the visitors 12 minutes into the second half. Grant Munro made a mistake 35 yards from goal - Dougie Imrie, who had pressurised the veteran into the error, gathered the ball, played a great flicked pass with the outside of his left foot to Paterson and the former Scotland Under-19 player, on-loan to Accies from Southend, ran down the old inside left channel into the County box before shooting across Fraser into the far corner of the County net.

This goal was a definite game killer; Accies relaxed, job done, while County went into damage limitation mode. But, they did win a corner out of nothing in 78 minutes and when Scott Morrison's set piece from the right came in, substitute Kurtis Byrne reacted fastest to volley home a consolation goal from eight yards.But Accies had the last word, substitute Grant Anderson cutting in from the right to wrong-foot Fraser in scoring his first goal for the club and complete the drubbing.