Gary Bowyer got his Dundee tenure off to a comfortable start with a 3-0 victory over 10-man Hamilton.
Taking on a Championship rival wasn’t the simplest tie to start the Premier Sports group stage but the Dark Blues eased to three points.
A storming run from Josh Mulligan set up the opener for Niall McGinn in the first half as the Northern Ireland international found the inside of the post.
Straight after the restart Alex Jakubiak netted his second-ever Dark Blues goal from the spot to put his side in control.
Former Dee Brian Easton would see red with 10 minutes to go after bringing Mulligan down on the edge of the area while Harry Sharp would make a couple of key saves in the second period.
Youngster Lyall Cameron, though, would finish things off with his first-ever Dundee goal in stoppage time.
But, what can we take from Bowyer’s first competitive match in charge?
Set-up
All eyes were on how Gary Bowyer might set his new team up after tinkering with a 4-4-2 at Montrose on Tuesday.
This time he went 4-2-3-1 with Max Anderson returning to fitness as the man in behind striker Zak Rudden.
That saw Paul McMullan and McGinn take up their usual places on the wings.
GOAL!
Dundee 2-0 Hamilton
Alex Jakubiak makes no mistake from the spot pic.twitter.com/rSoHokyYrV
— George Cran (@di_cranio) July 9, 2022
The one big change saw Sam Fisher make his first Dundee appearance since the club were last in the Championship.
The young defender looked assured alongside Ryan Sweeney, getting a timely confidence boost with his first involvement as he stepped in to take the ball off his marker.
Being the first match of the season and the sun beating down, Rudden, Jordan Marshall and Anderson were given a break at half-time.
On came Jakubiak, Paul McGowan and Jack Wilkie at left full-back. Young Cameron also replaced Paul McMullan with a distinctly youthful Dundee side ending the contest.
Much of the play was focused on playing to the wings from Harry Sharp and trying to build from there.
These early days showed Dundee’s quality was too much for Accies but there’s still plenty of work on the training field needed before they are firing as Bowyer would like.
Crowd
With only two stands open until the league campaign kicks off, it wasn’t exactly a bumper crowd to welcome Bowyer to the building with 1,760 in the stands (128 away).
After the disappointments of last season, that wasn’t a surprise.
However, the folks who piled into the Bobby Cox will be pretty pleased with the start made by the new manager after a comfortable afternoon against a Championship rival.
McGinn
While some of the talented youngsters at Dens Park might hog the headlines, the influence of Niall McGinn in the very early days of this season shouldn’t be ignored.
The 34-year-old showed his international class with the opening goal.
Mulligan will rightly get huge praise for opening up the chance with a trademark surging run.
But, it’s often said finishing is the hardest part of the game and McGinn made that part look very, very easy.
There wasn’t a big target to hit but he was clinical, passing the ball off the inside of the post.
If he keeps up this kind of form, the rest of the Championship will have a difficult task to contain Niall McGinn.
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