Saints welcome Accies in rearranged fixture

Saints welcome Hamilton Accies to McDiarmid Park on Wednesday night in a rearranged fixture that fell foul to the ‘Beast from the East’ earlier this month.

It’s the penultimate home fixture before the league split, and Saints come into the match having twice defeated their opponents earlier this season. Murray Davidson’s late header gave the home side a 2-1 victory at McDiarmid back in September, with Stefan Scougall the difference in the 1-0 win at New Douglas Park in December.

Following the weekend’s international break, Saints manager Tommy Wright is eager to get back to domestic action. The manager’s injury list is still long but he has been pleased with the progress made by those currently on the sidelines.

“One of the biggest plusses for us injury-wise has been the fantastic signs of recovery shown by Richard Foster,” Tommy said.

“Wednesday night against Hamilton looks like it’s probably come too soon for him, but he should be available and in the squad for Saturday. It’s a huge boost for us because the initial timescales given for his injury had him out right up until the very end of the season. To have him back so soon is great for the squad.

“The rest of the players who are currently injured have also been making steady progress. Callum Hendry has been able to train fully for the past couple of sessions, Stefan Scougall is getting there and David McMillan is working hard – although he is still some way off returning to full training.

“Brian Easton is now pain free so he’ll begin to increase his workload over the coming days and hopefully he’ll be available to us in the next few weeks. We’ve had difficult spells with injuries this season and at different points we’ve had up to eight first-team outfielders on the sidelines. It’s probably been the worst year for injuries that we’ve had since I’ve been here but I think we’ve managed to deal with it reasonably well.”

One of the players involved during the international break was defender Jason Kerr, who missed the match with Hibernian through suspension but will be back in the squad for the clash with Accies just days after picking up his first Scotland U21s cap.

“Jason will come back into the squad and we’re really pleased for him to have been handed his first U21 cap which is excellent. He’s done extremely well for us this season.

“Young Liam Gordon played very well against Hibernian so I will have a decision to make there but Jason will be back in contention on Wednesday.”

Another of Saints’ new internationals – David Wotherspoon – is suspended for the match but the manager was delighted to see his midfielder gain senior international experience for the first time over the weekend during Canada’s 1-0 victory over New Zealand.

“I knew that David wanted to make himself available for Canada, and it took a while to get it sorted. At 28-years-old, international football is maybe something that David thought would never happen for him but he’s managed to get an opportunity and we’re delighted for him. The more players we have playing at that level the better it is for the club.”

Wednesday’s visitors Accies are in 9th position – just one place and four points behind Saints – and come into the match unbeaten in their last three Scottish Premiership matches. Wright knows that Martin Canning’s side will provide a difficult test for his team as Saints look to finish the 2017/2018 season as high up the league table as possible.

“Both victories this season against Hamilton were by single goal margins and we actually went behind to them in the home match back in September and had to work hard to turn it around.

“It’s always a tough game against them and every year they seem to be written off yet they keep proving people wrong. They play for each other as a team and they make it very difficult for their opponents to play their normal game.

“Their points total is a lot higher this year than it has been in previous years and they’ll be looking to push on and continue their form so we’ll need to be at our best to get a positive result on the night.”

Kick-off against Hamilton Accies on Wednesday evening is 19:45. The referee for the match is Euan Anderson.