Scottish Premiership round-up: Wins for Dundee, Motherwell and Partick on first day of the season

Kilmarnock manager Lee Cark was sent to the stands by referee Craig Thomson after just 10 minutes at Rugby Park as his team were beaten 2-1 by Motherwell on the opening day of the Scottish Premiership.

Killie had gone into the game hoping to recover from a poor League Cup campaign but were second best as Lionel Ainsworth and Marvin Johnson struck either side of the break to set up the win.

The visitors came close on 13 minutes when Ainsworth used his pace to burst clear on the flank and clipped the ball into Scott McDonald who dragged a volley just past the post.

Johnson then crashed a powerful shot from 25 yards which flew over the bar before Steven Smith sent a free-kick from slightly further out onto the top of the net at the other end of the pitch.

Motherwell took the lead on 41 minutes when Ainsworth collected the ball just inside the Killie half and exchanged passes with McDonald before lofting the ball over the advancing Jamie MacDonald from just inside the box.

Killie survived another scare two minutes later when Johnson burst clear and sent his shot narrowly wide of the target.

But a minute after the break Johnson made no mistake when he headed superbly into the net from a Richard Tait delivery.

Killie continued to battle though and Craig Samson had to be lively to block a fierce free-kick from Kris Boyd.

But they did grab a consolation eight minutes from time with a headed goal from Martin Smith.

Rory Loy scored twice as Dundee got their league campaign off to a flyer with a 3-1 victory over Ross County in Dingwall.

County almost opened the scoring after 10 minutes through Brian Graham but Dundee goalkeeper Scott Bain clawed the ball off the line before the visitors cleared the danger

Three minutes later Mark O'Hara ran on to a chip from Danny Williams and squared the ball to Loy, who tapped past the exposed Scott Fox.

O'Hara was involved again in the incident that led to Dundee scoring their second goal when he was brought down by Paul Quinn inside the box.

From the resulting penalty Loy (41) blasted the ball into the middle of the net with Fox diving to his right.

And a minute before the interval O'Hara skipped past Jay McEveley to go through on goal but he placed his shot narrowly wide of the target.

County slipped further behind when they were caught on the break after 62 minutes as Loy found Michael Duffy and he set up Paul McGowan to slip the ball under 'keeper Fox.

The Hosts continued to push forward though and were denied when Bain produced a superb save to turn Michael Gardyne's goal-bound effort round the post.

But a minute later from a County corner Gardyne's shot deflected to Craig Curran (67) who tucked the ball away from an angle at close range.

At Firhill, Partick made a winning start as goals from Chris Erskine and Davie Amoo secured a 2-0 victory over Inverness CT.

The visitors created a chance after six minutes as on-loan midfielder Billy King crashed a powerful shot over the bar.

Partick made the breakthrough nine minutes before the break when Steven Lawless burst forward and stabbed the ball to the edge of the box for Erskine to step inside a defender and curl the ball into the far corner.

Caley Thistle had a chance to level on 58 minutes when Greg Tansey found space 20 yards out but he fired wide of Tomas Cerney's right-hand post.

And Inverness found themselves further behind just two minutes later after a Sean Welsh free kick was nodded across the face of goal by Abdul Osman and Amoo bundled the ball home.

Amoo was again involved 11 minutes later when his weighted cross found Lawless but his volley flew just wide of the target.

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