Gary Doctor hopes Sunday’s defeat to Hibernian will be just a bump in the road for Hamilton Accies in SWPL1 as he targets a huge three points away to Glasgow Women this weekend.
Accies got off to a flier on the opening day with a victory over Aberdeen but they were brought back down to earth with a 4-0 defeat at home to Hibernian
Doctor fielded the youngest side of his rein and admits there were a few lessons for his side to take on board, but he hopes they can channel that in the right way when they visit the division’s bottom side on Sunday.
Glasgow Women have suffered a bruising 14-0 defeat to Rangers and a 4-0 loss to Dundee United so far.
While Doctor is targeting a second victory in two games, he knows their rivals will sense an opportunity as well, with Accies bottom of the pile last term.
He said: “We are disappointed to lose the Hibs game 4-0 but we’ve got to put it in perspective sometimes.
“Hibs have really embarked on a push towards the professional game and they’ve brought players in from all over the world.
“A bit of quality was the difference on Sunday, but we are trying to refresh our team with some debuts for players who hadn’t played at this level before.
“It was probably the youngest team we’ve ever put out in the Premier League but it was a good experience for us. Getting that win on the first day took a little bit of pressure off and told us we are going in the right direction.
“Hopefully we will just see Hibs as a bump in the road and a game we can learn lessons from it for the Glasgow game. Glasgow will look at us as a team to target as well and we can’t take them lightly because of the start they’ve had.
“But it’s definitely in the winnable category and we are in a good place. I don’t think Sunday will have taken too much out of us and we go into the game with a good opportunity to get our second win of the season.”
Last season Accies picked up just 13 points, but Doctor is aiming high this term and is confident of making a push up the table, despite an additional two sides in the revamped SWPL.
He added: “I think we can look up from where we finished last season [10th] and I think the top half of the table would be quite a stretch, given the differences in resources.
“Rather than looking at a final position, we are asking if we can target improvements on points totals for the month, head-to-heads against our rivals. If we get that right, our position in the table will take care of itself.
“There’s room for improvement in our squad and I’ve seen that already in terms of our game against Hibs on Sunday, despite the score-line.”
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