Law in it for the points
Josh Law is far more concerned with getting three much-needed points for Motherwell than dishing out vengeance on Hamilton.
Motherwell have lost nine goals without reply in two Scottish Premiership games against their neighbours this season while also suffering a League Cup defeat on penalties at New Douglas Park.
The defeats have been the low points of a season that has not been short on disappointment but Motherwell have shown real signs of improvement in recent weeks and can move four points ahead of bottom club St Mirren when they host Accies on Friday night.
Law, who has been playing at right-back in recent weeks, said: "We have had a couple of beatings off them to be honest and obviously the cup loss earlier in the year.
"We will approach it like any other game, we are not out for revenge or anything but we desperately need the win so we will be looking to get our first win against them.
"The two games haven't gone how we wanted them to but we have a few fresh players who didn't experience that and we are all just keen to get on with it.
"It's a must-win game, all the games are at this stage of the season in the position we are."
Manager Ian Baraclough had won his first two games in charge before being brought crashing back to earth with a 5-0 New Year's Day derby thrashing.
And he knows they have to reverse the Lanarkshire side's fortunes.
"We have got to for the sake of our supporters and the sake of ourselves, we want three points," Baraclough said. "It's a home game and we want to make sure the supporters enjoy their weekend.
"It's three crucial points against our local rivals and a team that we have not done fantastically well against this season.
"There's the carrot for us that we reverse those defeats and take ourselves into next week on the up."
Hamilton boss Martin Canning does not believe there is any point making his side watch re-runs of this season's double demolition job on Motherwell - because it is not the same Fir Park side they will face.
Accies travel the six miles to their near neighbours hoping to kick-start their season under new player/manager Canning.
Alex Neil's successor is still waiting for his first win as boss despite having had 10 attempts since being appointed in January.
Canning admits that run has emptied his side's confidence reserves.
Ordinarily the 33-year-old would sit his men down in front of the TV and make them watch repeat performances of their last two victories over the Steelmen - September's 4-0 triumph and a 5-0 drubbing on New Year's Day - in order to raise their spirits.
But with Well boss Baraclough having signed up eight new players since their last meeting, Canning is not sure his team could learn anything from those previous thumpings.
He told Press Association Sport: "Before we play an opponent, we will watch their last three games and see what we can learn from it.
"At times, we will watch back games of our own as well - it's something we have done from time to time.
"However, for me the past is the past. You can look back on things too much - you need to look to the future.
"I can speak to the boys about the 5-0 game and the 4-0 game and we will all know we are capable of beating Motherwell.
"But their personnel has changed a lot since we last played them so there might not be too many lessons from those games.
"We have our scouts go watch them obviously and we will hopefully have a good idea of how they will play, the system they will use and how they will line up.
"But we can't really look too much at the past results because it's now a different team we are playing."
Source: PA
