HAMILTON boss Billy Reid has admitted that the dismissal of skipper Alex Neil has taken the gloss off Accies 2-1 win over Cowdenbeath.

The New Douglas Park skipper, whose red card was his third so far this season, will now miss out for the next three weeks after his early bath for two bookable offences.

With Accies now set to travel to Fife to face Raith Rovers, Reid fears their five- game unbeaten run has been put in jeopardy by Neil's rashness.

The Accies boss said: "Alex has not done a lot wrong and to be honest I thought there was hardly a bad tackle in the game.

"But Alex is our captain and he plays on the edge. If you take that away from him he would not be the same player.

"That said, we have just begun to get a settled team and get a bit of momentum going and now we will be without our skipper for the next three games – that will leave us short for experience.

"Really, aside from Kevin Cuthbert in goal and Martin Canning at the back, we are a very youthful side – so it is frustrating."

Reid added: "But as far as the result goes I am just glad that even though we did not produce our best we still got the win.

"We have Raith Rovers next and a point to prove."