There were a few yellow warnings flying around yesterday but it was a red alert that blew Ayr United’s William Hill Scottish Cup ambitions off course at stormy Somerset Park.
Aaron Muirhead’s reckless lunge on 26 minutes saw him sent off with the match evenly poised at 1-1. The Met Office should have probably issued an advisory to the Ayr dugout right then because within a few seconds of that ordering off, St Johnstone had forged ahead and took control of the tussle. It wasn’t the best of days for Muirhead. St Johnstone’s equaliser came from a deflection off him.
“It’s so close to the first yellow that it’s stupid,” said Ayr manager Mark Kerr of Muirhead’s rush of blood. “You’ve got to just hold back a wee bit and I think Aaron knows that. It’s disappointing after the start we made. We set up to attack with three players up top and then when we lost the goal to make it level it didn’t rock us as we went on the front foot again. But the sending off has really set the game up to be in St Johnstone’s favour."
📹🔵⚪️| Morning Saints fans!
— St. Johnstone FC (@StJohnstone) February 9, 2020
Fantastic support yesterday in that horrible weather, listen to that wind 🌪😱
Away fans in fine voice throughout helping us through to the last 8️⃣!#SJFC pic.twitter.com/wRmBOJrtEH
This was always going to be a treacherous trip for the visitors and Ayr wasted no time in flinging a few more nails down on the road. Only four minutes had passed when a tidy move led to Aaron Drinan sliding a tidy finish into the net.
The cup upset was off and running but it was brought to shuddering halt amid a 10 minute spell of toil and trouble for the hosts. On 17 minutes, Callum Hendry and Muirhead both rose for a cross and it appeared that the Ayr man diverted it into his own net. Having then picked up a yellow card a few minutes later, Muirhead clattered Liam Craig and was sent off.
Within 60 seconds of that dismissal, a wounded Ayr were dealt another hefty dunt when St Johnstone edged ahead. There was no doubting the scorer this time as Hendry got on the end of Ralston’s cross and plonked in a fine header at the back post.
St Johnstone continued to pose plenty of menace in the second half and had chances to put Ayr to the sword. Wotherspoon performed a nice little twist and turn in the box but his shot was well saved by Doohan. Stevie May then conjured a neatly floated chip which evaded the keeper but clipped the post before Ayr had a final chance to salvage something only for Drinan to slice wide.
“I think Ayr will feel a bit unlucky as they started the game really well,” said the St Johnstone manager, Tommy Wright. “Once it settled, we got the equaliser and were in control and then the sending off happened. For us to score straight after that was a big blow for them. Both sides deserve a lot of credit, the conditions were horrendous.”
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