Raith Rovers 2-2 Hamilton Accies: Dougie Imrie on opening pre-season friendly
Although not happy with his side’s “sluggish” start in Saturday’s 2-2 home friendly draw against League One Hamilton Accies, Raith Rovers gaffer Dougie Imrie praised his Championship side for their second half display in fighting back from 2-0 down.
Trailing by two goals at the interval to goals by Dom Thomas and Paul Hanlon (own goal), Rovers earned a share of the spoils thanks to Lewis Vaughan’s headed second half double as Stark’s Park fans got their first close up view of the club’s new state-of-the-art artificial pitch.
“I certainly think it was a game of two halves,” boss Imrie told Raith TV post match. “By our own standards as a football club, the first half was nowhere near the level.
"I thought we were very slow with our build-up.
"They’ve had two shots at goal in the whole game, which basically sums up our afternoon.
"The tempo second half was much more like us in the way we want to play the game this season at home at Stark’s Park and also away from home.
"But they know that. I’m not saying anything here that I’ve not said to the players.
"The first half was way below the standard, but the one thing I can give them leeway with is it’s their first pre-season friendly and they are getting used to each other.
"A lot of new faces from last season are starting to get used with how we want to play.
"Overall a very good exercise. I’ve got to thank Hamilton and my good friend Daz for coming over to play the game.
"But it also gives us a flavour of how the game’s going to look when we play in the league cup in a few weeks.
"They played two 45s as well with two different teams. They’ve still got a few starters that weren’t involved today to come in so they’ll be stronger.
"Much better second half, excellent, two great goals as well.”
Elaborating on the “lots of positives” in the second half, Imrie added: “Second half I certainly thought our wingers kept their shape more on the white line.
"It allowed us as a midfield just to start getting a lot more freedom in there.
"I thought first half there were too many overloads in the middle of the pitch, our wingers were coming away in, there was nowhere to play.
"There were a lot of stray passes that Hamilton capitalised on and gave us problems first half.
"But we had the chance to change it at half-time and you saw the difference in performance second half.”
Imrie was also able to utilise pretty much his full squad across the two halves, which pleased him.
He said: “Apart from Dycey (Callum Fordyce), Hanno (Paul Hanlon) and Josh (Rae), the rest was a change.
"The players are going to be starting off the league up and the league campaign so I think it’s important that everybody gets to know each other and how they play.
"In the second half we got into some great areas, Robbo’s (John Robertson’s) free-kick at the end could have won the game. I thought wee Gibbo (Lewis Gibson) did well in the wide area, Charlie (Telfer) and Scott (Brown) and Kai (Montagu) were excellent in the middle of the pitch.”