Martin Canning says that it has never crossed his mind to tweak Hamilton's preparations for a match depending upon which referee is to officiate, and that he won’t be copying this weekend's opponents Hearts by practicing playing with ten men.
Hearts manager Robbie Neilson caused controversy after the last meeting between the sides by claiming his side had specifically prepared for referee Willie Collum sending off one of his men.
Collum red-carded Callum Paterson in the match, a decision which was subsequently overturned on appeal, and Neilson blamed the whistler for his side’s eventual 3-2 defeat.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, and more than likely to the relief of Neilson, Collum will not be in charge of the return fixture on Saturday, with Bobby Madden officiating.
Whilst anticipating another stormy encounter at Tynecastle, Hamilton boss Canning says he is more concerned about bouncing back from defeat against St Johnstone than any bearing the referee might have on the match.
“I knew that would come up!” he laughed.
“No, we just train as normal, we don’t do anything like that. We don’t think about scenarios like that, we just train and play our game as normal.
“We’ve probably been down to ten men more than anybody this season, so we don’t need the practice!
“I think it will be another good game. They’ve picked up recently and they’re doing well.
“I went to watch them against Celtic and they were a bit unlucky, Leigh Griffiths was the only difference between the sides.
“Going there is never easy, but we’ll be preparing properly and will be trying to win the match.
“It’s probably one of the best atmospheres in the league and it’s one of the grounds that I enjoy going to as a manager and a player.
“We know that our boys have the mentality that they want to go and perform in surroundings like that and they want to show their best. You want the boys to thrive on these sort of occasions.
“If we go and put everything into it and the boys play to their capabilities, then we’re just as capable as anyone to go and win there.
“I think the players have shaken off the disappointment of last weekend. Training has been good this week.
“You’ve got to look forward to the next game because you can’t affect what’s already happened. The boys have put it behind them and we look forward to Saturday now.
“As a manager it can be difficult, you probably feel the highs and lows more than the players do, but from a player’s point of view there’s no point dwelling on bad games or even good games, you’ve got to focus on the next game.”
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