A superbly placed late goal by Rosie McQuillan wins the game for The Spiders.
Ellie Kane heads Queen’s into the lead in the 18th minute, cancelled out ten minutes later by Accies Josie Giard.
Captain Abby Callaghan makes her first start of the season.
Queen’s welcomed Hamilton Accies to Kirkintilloch in the opening fixture of this season’s ScottishPower WPL2 campaign.
Accies, newly demoted from SWPL1 and Queen’s runners-up in last season’s SWPL1 play-offs hadn’t played each other for many years, both sides with high expectations of progress this season.
It was Hamilton who created the first scoring opportunity when ex-Spider Chloe Muir hit the post with a shot just inside the Queen’s box.
A couple of minutes later, Jasmine McPhie had to dive at the feet of Chloe Muir to prevent a certain goal chance.
Queen’s survived the initial Accies onslaught and started to gain control of the ball with Summer Thomson and Hannah Cairns causing the Accies defence problems.
In the 18th minute, The Spiders broke down the right. The ball was played to Rachael O’Neill who swung in an inch perfect cross for ELLIE KANE to powerfully head home from seven yards out.
Ten minutes later Hannah Cairns broke down the left, cut inside and fired in a shot that narrowly missed the far post.
Two minutes later Hamilton drew level. JOSIE GIARD took advantage of indecision in the Spiders defence to hit a low shot into the corner of the net from 18 yards out.
Just before half-time, Ellie Kane, intercepted a pass out of defence, beat two players and fired in a shot which was parried by the Accies keeper.
Half-time: Queen’s Park 1 Hamilton Academical 1.
The second period started with Queen’s in attack. Hannah Cairns was finding space on the left and using that space to stretch the Accies defence.
Two minutes in, Hannah delivered a superb ball to the edge of the Accies six-yard box for Ellie Kane to step onto and shoot. Her shot narrowly missing the near post.
Neither team were dominant with the game becoming bogged down in the middle of the pitch.
In the 55th Abby Callaghan was replaced by Rosie McQuillan. Good to see Abby back after injury kept her out for most of the Sky Sports Cup games.
The game continued as before with Queen’s pushing for a winner. However Jasmine McPhie had to look lively on more than one occasion to divert shots from Accies breakouts.
Queen’s were getting closer with Ellie Kane and Summer Thomson both through only to be denied by the assistant’s flag for off-side.
The breakthrough came in the 83rd minute. A ball played into the Queen’s half was headed out by Ellie Kane wide to Hannah Cairns. Hannah sped down the left side and shot from just inside the Accies box. The Hamilton keeper parried the shot with the ball falling to Summer Thomson. Summer’s shot was cleared by an Accies defender to the edge of the box. ROSIE McQUILLAN, waiting at the edge of the box, calmly slotted the ball into the net, via the far post.
In the 85th minute Summer Thomson was replaced by Freya Ashmead.
In the dying minutes of the game, Jasmine McPhie, once again, blocked a shot from Chloe Muir to deny Accies an equaliser.
Full-time: Queen’s Park 2 Hamilton Academical 1
Queen’s Park: Jasmine McPhie, Charley Dickson, Rachael O’Neill, Abbie Cusack, Darcy Molley, Murron Cunningham, Summer Thomson (Freya Ashmead), Abby Callaghan (Rosie McQuillan), Rachel Wright, Hannah Cairns, Ellie Kanre.
Subs not used: Natalie Angelini, Ciara Bonner, Zoe Mooney, Rebecca McAllister, Louise Cameron, Lila Sallis, Evie Swann.
Starting Eleven
