Teale: First home win well deserved

The quality of the game was not helped by difficult weather conditions in Paisley, but t he Buddies deserved their win over a poor Accies side and Teale was thrilled to get the three points.

Asked if the victory had been a long time coming, he replied: "Far too long! It's certainly nice now that we can just look forward.

"I've tried to take as much pressure off the team as I can, and I just said that anything that has gone in the past there's no point dwelling on it. We just need to approach every game in a positive frame of mind and thankfully we managed to get the win.

"I thought it was [well deserved], if I'm honest with you. Certainly first half, the amount of balls we had in the box and the opportunities where maybe a little bit more care or composure would have worked out well for us, but unfortunately we never managed to do that until the second half.

"At the end of the day, with the position we're in in the league and with the conditions, we're just delighted to get the win."

Teale has been trying to keep his players' minds focused on looking forward to the forthcoming run of matches in the relegation battle, rather than allowing the fact that they had not won at home since last May become a monkey on their back.

"I've certainly not focused on it and I've not really mentioned it the players, if I'm honest," Teale said. "It's just everybody else that wants to talk about it.

"I just look forward all the time. Anything that's gone in the past we can analyse it as staff in terms of what we do to try to put it right. I think a lot of our performances this season at home have probably merited a win but it's not happened.

"Hopefully I'm sitting here come the end of the season and I'm speaking about going on a run where we've won every home game."

Teale's delight was only tempered somewhat by the news that all of the other sides in the bottom four had also recorded victories on the day, but he insisted that St Mirren were only looking at themselves.

"I've said right from day one that we can only concentrate on what we're doing and, as long as our performances are decent and we're picking up victories, then it's always going to be in our hands," he said.

"We just need to concentrate on ourselves. I know it's pretty boring and a cliche as well, but taking one game at a time is how it is and that's how it has to be.

Hamilton player-manager Martin Canning was, in stark contrast, furious with his side's performance.

"It was a poor game quality-wise, and the disappointing thing was that St Mirren seemed to want it more," he said.

"With the group of players I've got and with what I know they're capable of, that hurts me more than anything."