RORY MCKENZIE has admitted that Kilmarnock need to appoint a new manager as soon as possible to give the club a major lift for the second half of the season.
Killie passed up the opportunity to go within two points off Championship leaders Arbroath on Wednesday night after slipping up at home to Morton.
The game finished 1-1 at Rugby Park, with the Ayrshire side left rueing a series of wonderful goalscoring chances.
McKenzie bagged Killie’s only goal of the night with a thunderous strike into the bottom corner mid-way through the first-half.
They really should’ve been out of sight had Jack Hamilton not pulled off a couple of superb saves from efforts by Callum Hendry and Scott Robinson.
Alan Lithgow levelled the scoring with a fine glancing header for the Ton after the break, as Killie – who were still under the stewardship of Head of Football Operations James Fowler – stuttered to the finish.
The result leaves the Ayrshire outfit in third spot, four-points off the summit in their bid for automatic promotion having played the same amount of games as their direct rivals.
And McKenzie reckons the new-manager bounce is needed and fast.
He said: “It’s been frustrating for a while. At half-time the game should be done and dusted.
“With every chance we get, you know they’ll get one too as they’re really good from set-pieces and long throws. You could almost feel it coming.
“The whole team is responsible. But it’s not half chances that we’re missing.
“If you look back across the season so far, if we score first, we should go on to win the game. We’re not doing that.
“If you put those chances away, you get away with the bad performances. When you’re not scoring it highlights how poor we have been at certain points. We’ve got to score.
“Stability will help – you usually get a boost when a manager comes in. We don’t know anything that’s going on. You tend to get a lift though. We don’t know if he’s in the stands watching.
“But we need that, as we’re starting to fall back a bit, so we need that final push.”
Fowler may have been tasked with taking the team on an interim basis after Tommy Wright’s departure for the last two games, but he is also heavily relied upon to help the board in their search for the club’s next appointment.
It’s understood that the club were taking the next steps in their recruitment drive both yesterday and today, with interviews taking place.
The former League Cup winner refused to give a definitive timeline for when the new boss would be in position.
But he admitted the new man would ideally be place before the club’s next game which is away to Queen of the South in eight-days’ time, with this weekend’s derby versus Ayr postponed.
He said: “We will speak to candidates over the next few days, it’s probably handy not having a game this weekend as it gives us a breather.
“It would be ideal having someone in early to give them a full week of training if possible.
“I would like to think that will happen. These things are never straight forward, but there are enough good candidates interested in the post.”
Meanwhile, Morton defender Alan Lithgow was delighted with the point at Rugby Park.
The match was Dougie Imrie’s first game in senior management having been appointed the new boss at Cappielow last week.
The away side had to dig deep in this one to get anything from the game, but Lithgow was encouraged to see swift signs of improvement under Imrie’s guidance.
The ex-Livingston man pinpointed Hamilton’s performance in goal especially.
He said: Both teams worked really hard. I felt as though we could do better at times.
“I think we’d have lost the game if it wasn’t for Jack Hamilton to be honest with you. They had a few clear-cut chances and he made some unbelievable saves.
“I think it’s down to him that we got that draw.
“The boys are working very hard. You should see us in training, we’re grafting hard every day. We’re always in there until the end.
“We don’t want to be sitting down the bottom end of the table. We want to start pushing on. The only way you can do that is by getting results.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here