Scottish Football Is Alive And Well

23 September 2012 12:17
There appears to be more freedom of expression and football being played in the SPL this season

Kenny Shiels like his football and enjoyed the display from both sides as his Kilmarnock side beat St Mirren 3-1 in what he described as a fantastic advert for Scottish football. Cillian Sheridan scored his first goal for the Ayrshire side as they secured their second successive league home win. He opened the scoring on 26 minutes when he glanced home Danny Racchi's pin-point delivery and James Fowler doubled Killie's lead 12 minutes into the second half. Things did not get any better for the visitors when James Dayton's wonderful individual effort on the hour mark added to St Mirren's misery and despite Paul McGowan's deflected consolation, the hosts held on comfortably for all three points. Shiels said: "When you have two teams like Kilmarnock and St Mirren coming to the stage you are going to get football and there's going to be rotation and movement in the pattern of play.  I have so much respect for the way in which St Mirren play and today's game was a great advert for Scottish football. I thought that in the games between the two sides last season the team that had the most of the ball ended up losing. St Mirren were very good and for the first 20 minutes of the game they had victory of the ball, but we changed a few things and from being 1-0 up we were worthy winners." Shiels was pleased to see Sheridan score his debut goal for Killie after joining from CSKA Sofia earlier this month. Sheridan has signed a two-year-deal at Rugby Park and his goal seemed to spark life into the Killie performance following a difficult opening 20 minutes. Shiels went on: "It was good for Cillian to score, we self-destructed with two gift passes to them in the early exchanges and Kyle Letheren was outstanding in that period of play to deny St Mirren a goal. Getting the goal put us in a positive note. It's too early to be looking at league tables but very nice to get a result. Too often last season we were draw, draw in successive games, we will continue to try win every game and get away from draws." Shiels opposite number, Danny Lennon was frustrated after his St Mirren side failed to capitalise on their first-half dominance. Lewis Guy passed up two good opportunities to open the scoring for Saints before they fell behind . Lennon said: "We started very well and I really enjoyed the first-half performance with the exception of the missed opportunities we created. The penalty-box incidents were the main difference between the two sides and all credit to Kilmarnock, they took their chances. We were punished by defensive errors and by the time we got the goal back the game was beyond us. I'm really grateful we have a cup tie against Hamilton on Tuesday and the opportunity to bounce back from our disappointment."

Source: FOOTYMAD