It was the home support's turn to be incensed when Thomson blew his whistle for a head knock suffered by Derek Young as Barry Ferguson continued theplay by slotting the ball intothenet from 22 yards.
Kovalchuk cranked a shot from the blue line that hit the back of thenet and bounced back intoplay as the referees signaled no goal, believing the puck had hit the crossbar.
But it was all going Kilmarnock's way and in the 70th minute McLaren grabbed his second when he capitalised on slack play in the home defence to slam the ball high intothenet from close range.