Scoring a vital goal in your birthday week is not bad but the chance to get a game for your national side will top that.

It would be quite a celebration if Hamilton midfielder James McCarthy were to be called up for the Republic of Ireland on Wednesday which just happens to be his 18th birthday. However, for the moment, McCarthy would be content with three points from a league win over Hearts. Saturday saw the precocious teenager opened the scoring in the draw against Falkirk, helping the New Douglas Park team to hold onto their first point in the SPL since September following a run of six straight losses. McCarthy has been the target of the boo-boys for his decision to play for the Republic of Ireland. He tries to ignore them and is looking forward to his chance in his national first team. He said: "I'll be 18 on Wednesday and it would be great to get a call-up, but as it stands I'm not in the squad yet, so I just play my own game and get on with things. Neither the club nor I have heard anything, though, so we'll need to wait and see what happens, but I'm not going to get carried away. The stick I've had doesn't bother me - I just get on with my own game, and it was great to score a goal in this match although it was disappointing to lose an equaliser in the second half."

McCarthy is now hoping to help his team collect another win bonus of the season when they visit Tynecastle on his birthday. He said: "The most important thing was to get three points, and I would rather have had a win than a goal. It's great to score and get a point but I thought we should have won the game as we were a little bit better than Falkirk; and especially when we're at home, we need to start picking up points against teams like them who are round about us in the table. My goal was a decent strike - Mark McLaughlin tried an overhead kick but ended up hitting it back to me with his studs; he says he meant it!"

Falkirk managed to equalise thanks to scorer Michael Higdon found the net within two minutes of coming on for Patrick Cregg at the start of the second half,. Understandably, he was delighted that his instant impact earned his side a point and ended his own nine-game drought. He said: "It wasn't a bad first touch! It's probably the quickest impact I've made and it was a good goal; I just tried to get as much power on it as I could and luckily it went in the top corner. I've been needing a goal for the past few weeks because I haven't scored for a while, not since we played Raith in the second round of the League Cup (in August) - for a striker, that's rubbish, but hopefully this will let me kick on. Last year I scored 10 goals and I was out for four months of the season with injuries, so hopefully I can break that barrier this season, I don't see why not. Hopefully I've done enough to get a start against Inverness on Wednesday and then to stay in the team. After my equaliser I just thought we were going to go on and win the game as we had all the impetus and put a lot of pressure on Hamilton, but it wasn't to be."

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