Hamilton Academical 0-2 Livingston
Second half goals from Jon Guthrie and Josh Mullin sealed a fifth win in a row for the Lions and secured back-to-back top flight away wins for the first time since 2003.
David Martindale made one change to the team who had booked a place in the Betfred Cup semi-finals with captain Marvin Bartley missing out through suspension and he was replaced by Jason Holt in the middle of the park.
The Lions controlled the game from the off and almost made that early dominance count as Alan Forrest’s ball from the left was flicked just past the near post by Scott Pittman.
The hosts couldn’t deal with cross balls as Mullin then delivered a dangerous ball of his own to Scott Robinson, but his superb glancing header beat Fulton but came down off the crossbar before being cleared by the Accies back-line.
Mullin then found Robinson again with another cross from the right, but instead of going for goal at the back post the forward decided to head across goal to no avail.
Mullin’s delivery continued to threaten as David Moyo almost diverted a cross from the wide man into his own net before Guthrie somehow diverted wide from close range from the corner.
his fourth goal of the season. Forrest done excellently on the left before pulling the ball back for Jason Holt who clipped a fantastic ball to the back post for the stand-in captain who made no mistake, heading home from close range.
Hamilton showed no signs of a revival as Livingston continued to dominate, with Forrest having two efforts in quick succession go wide of either post before Robinson had a one-on-one saved by Kyle Gourlay, who came on for the injured Ryan Fulton.
A 1-0 win would have, of course, been enough to seal the three points but the Lions would have headed back to West Lothian perhaps annoyed at not scoring more goals – before Josh Mullin stepped up to do just that. Former Lion Hakeem Odoffin fouled Scott Pittman 20 yards from goal and the winger, who had impressed all evening, stepped up to curl the bacl beond Gourlay and seal another 3 points.
Another great win for Livingston as the club continues to climb the table under the stewardship of Martindale. Up next – a difficult Boxing Day trip to Kilmarnock.
Hamilton Academical: Fulton (⇔ Gourlay 63), Stirling, Martin, Easton (⇔ Hamilton 86), Hodson, Odofin ▊, Hughes (⇔ Johnson 62), McMann, Munro, Mimnaugh, Moyo (⇔ Winter 67)
Subs not used: Trafford, Stanger, Owolabi, Scully
Livingston: Stryjek, Devlin, Fitzwater, Guthrie, Serrano, Holt, Sibbald, Mullin, Pittman, Forrest (⇔ Emmanuel-Thomas 78), Robinson
Subs not used: McCrorie, Brown, Poplatnik, McMillan, Ambrose, Taylor-Sinclair, Lawson, Pignatiello
Goals: Guthrie (52), Mullin (90)
Referee: Gavin Duncan
HT: 0-0
Att: BCD
Match Report: Dave Black