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Table as at Saturday 7th December 2019:

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Glasgow Rangers

15

12

2

1

41

12

38

29

Glasgow Celtic

15

12

2

1

34

10

38

24

Heart of Midlothian

16

10

2

4

34

24

32

10

Aberdeen

16

9

3

4

25

22

30

3

Kilmarnock

16

6

4

6

19

18

22

1

St Mirren

16

7

1

8

21

28

22

-7

Motherwell

15

6

2

7

19

20

20

-1

Hibernian

16

4

5

7

23

26

17

-3

Livingston

15

4

4

7

17

29

16

-12

St Johnstone

16

3

5

8

17

25

14

-8

Ross County

16

2

3

11

9

24

9

-15

Hamilton Academical

16

1

3

12

10

31

6

-21

 

Friday 6th December 2019

Aberdeen

1

0

St Mirren

 

Saturday 7th December 2019

Hearts

1

2

Kilmarnock

Ross County

0

0

Hibernian

St Johnstone

1

1

Hamilton

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Sunday 15th December 2019: Heart of Midlothian v Glasgow Celtic (SPL)

Venue: Tynecastle

Att: 20,099

Our one blank midweek in December was spent forgetting that the previous weekend had happened. We were hosting Celtic, next, at Tynecastle, who we’d drawn 1-1 with at the end of September at Parkhead and against whom, if we were to have any hope of getting a similar result or better, we would need to significantly improve.

Training was fine, but then it had been fine over the previous fortnight or so but performances simply hadn’t been up to muster. Celtic, meanwhile, were remaining neck and neck with their city rivals at the top of the table and both sides looked nigh on unstoppable.

At the pre-match press conference, I was asked a question about the future of Jack Ross, who was coming under pressure down the road at Hibs. “It’s not really my place to comment,” I said, “but I know Jack a bit and he’s an excellent manager. If he’s given time, he’ll get things right at Easter Road.”

Later that evening, I got a text from Jack thanking me for my support. That was a nice touch.

Saturday dawned and the weather was Siberian. Snow was coming down and settling, so I left the flat early and walked the mile and a half or so to Tynecastle. That was partly out of safety, and partly because I love nothing more than walking in fresh snow, when it crunches underneath your feet as you walk and the slightly muffled, insulated feeling around you.

Upon arrival I slapped my bag into my office and wandered downstairs to the dressing rooms, the kit was already all set up and the place was as spotless as a surgeon’s theatre. Nodding in approval I popped by club bobble hat on and wandered down the tunnel towards the pitch. Old Jocky was out there, as I knew he would be, patrolling and checking.

He’d done a superb job with his assistants clearing the surface of the snow, the lines were fully visible and he’d gone over them in blue paint, my only concern was over whether or not the surface would be frozen.

“Ach, wee Jones, have a step on it.” He instructed me when I voiced my worries.

I did so and the surface felt firm, but certainly not frozen. Just like a summer surface that had a slick top-layer and firm underneath.

“And?”

“It’s perfect,” I said.

“Aye, as if I’d let ye down, wee man.” Jocky said.

At that moment the match referee and his two assistants arrived and introduced themselves. “If it’s okay with you gentlemen, we’ll just have a look at the surface?”

“Of course,” I said. “Help yourselves.”

“Aye, by all means,” Jocky added. “Just mind you don’t smudge the paintwork, lads.” I looked at him incredulously and he returned a wink in my direction. We stood there, watching the officials check every square inch of the surface, the goalmouths, the touchlines that the assistants would be running, the perimeter path. It took about 10 minutes or so before they returned to us, in the mouth of the tunnel.

“Well, gentlemen, you’ve done a fine job, I’m more than happy for the game to go ahead.” The man in the middle of the three said.

“Ach, it’s nothing to do with this fella,” Jocky chimed in, giving my ribs a sharp jab with his elbow, “he jus’ benefits from my graft!”

The cheeky sod! Not that there wasn’t an element of truth in what he said. Anyway, game on!

Having had a week between matches, I only made the one change with Uche Ikpeazu returning to the starting line-up and Jamie Walker dropping to the bench. Stevie Naismith dropped back into the attacking midfield role behind the two strikers. I didn’t say much to the lads before the game, they knew my expectations, they’d been drilled in throughout the week in the lead up to the match. Quite simply, be better! The only thing I added was “see if they fancy this early on, don’t be reckless, but don’t be afraid to put one or two challenges in on them. Check their attitude.”

A bit old school, perhaps, but I fancied seeing how they would respond to a bit more of a physical challenge alongside the footballing one I hoped we’d provide.

It was a full house, the place was bouncing – as much as anything, I suspected, to try and get some warmth flowing around the place. Celtic kicked off, but within 15 seconds we should have been ahead.

A ball forward found only found Michael Smith, who knocked it towards Naismith on the halfway line. He found Glenn Whelan who then released Mulraney in behind the napping Moritz Bauer. He took one touch just inside the penalty area to gather it into his stride and then rather using his second to either shoot or square it to Uche, he took it on to narrow the angle towards goal. Then he took the wrong option, choosing to shoot from the acute angle rather than look for Uche, or even drilling it across the 6-yard box hoping that it’d get a touch from a defender, and the ball missed the far post on its way behind for a goal-kick.

We had started much the better side, we were right up for this one and Celtic, to paraphrase Corporal Jones ‘didn’t like it up ‘em!’ In the 9th minute, a Montolivo corner found Uche outjumping Kristoffer Ajer at the far post. His header beat Fraser Forster all ends up but crashed down off the crossbar to be cleared by a gratefully waiting defender.

Double the time, and Celtic managed their first decent effort on goal. A free kick was conceded about 30-yards from goal. Leigh Griffiths stepped up and leathered a superb swerving effort towards goal. Although straight at Pereira, near enough, it was moving in the air and the power of the strike made it too hot to handle. He tried to push it away from danger but couldn’t and as two Green & White shirts reacted rather faster than any Maroon ones, Ajer tapped into the empty net to give the Bhoys the advantage against the run of play. Most onlookers would have put that down as a goalkeeping error, I was more disappointed with our reaction to the second ball that was completely non-existent.

Five minutes later, a patient build-up from back to front down the right flank saw the ball worked from Smith inside to Naismith. Turning just inside his own half, he then released Washington in behind the Celtic defence with an expertly judged ball. The striker ran through, and although Forster made an excellent save, the ball fell to the onrushing Uche, who from a tight angle not unlike that which faced Mulraney in the opening stages, managed to tuck the ball into the back of the empty net. Shades of Mark Hughes in the 1991 Cup-Winners Cup Final against Barcelona. It was the striker’s 8th goal of the season and he was swiftly becoming a cult figure amongst the Jambo Army.

Things settled into an absorbing end-to-end affair with Celtic happy to let us play in front of them and look to hit on the break. A couple of half-chances fell to the Bhoys and whilst they had more efforts at goal, the better ones fell our way. 10 minutes before the break, a swift break of our own saw Naismith and Washington combine to unleash Mulraney’s pace once again down the inside left channel. He outpaced Bauer and was desperately unfortunate to see his powerful strike beat Forster but once again, not the crossbar, the rebound being smuggled clear by Odsonne Edouard.

Six minutes later, and a Grifiths corner into the heart of the penalty area was met by the head of Nir Bitton, but his effort glanced off the top of the angle of post and bar on its way behind. That was the final clear-cut effort of a first half that had been infinitely better from our point of view.

HALF TIME: Heart of Midlothian 1-1 Glasgow Celtic

I couldn’t have been happier with the boys at the break, we’d been excellent and unfortunate not to be coming in ahead. However, there was a cautionary note to my words. “Remember Ibrox, boys. Don’t let that happen again. They don’t really fancy this today, but if we go behind all of a sudden they’ll be champing at the bit. Stay on it, keep going and get what you deserve.”

The opening half of the second period was very even with the two sides largely cancelling each-other out, the conditions were noticeably worsening as the snow continued to fall. In the 69th minute, Leigh Griffths sprung our offside trap, not that we really had one, beat Pereira at his near post but saw his effort cannon back into play where this time Smith was on hand to clear. 1-1 in goals and 2-2 in woodwork strikes. Even stuff.

With less than 15 minutes remaining, and both sides giving as good as they were getting, another ball forward this time saw sub Mikey Johnston played through. He tried to bend it around Pereira right-footed, but the goalkeeper didn’t commit himself until the last possible moment and plunged to his left to make an excellent save, making sure he diverted the ball away from the onrushing Griffiths and allowing Aidan White to bring it clear.

Into the final ten minutes, and a rare slack pass from Glenn Whelan was intercepted, once again our high line was breached as Griffiths went through on goal. Again Pereira stood up, again the forward tried to bend it around him, this time left-footed, again the goalkeeper made a very good block.

We never quite got to the point of ‘hanging on’, but the final whistle came as a relief. The boys were out on their feet having put in a monumental shift and fully deserved their point. Had the game lasted another quarter of an hour, the chances are Celtic would have scored again and gone onto win the game. Thankfully, that was all ifs, buts and maybes. We’d picked up a valuable and very good point and made sure that the defeat against Killie hadn’t hit us too hard.

“Well done, boys,” I said back in the dressing room. “That moves us back above Aberdeen, I’m really proud of your efforts. Go out tonight, have a good time, have a drink but behave!” They were off out for their Christmas party, I’d decided not to be a part of it preferring instead to have a quiet night in. “We’ll be keeping an eye on Instagram, any nonsense and it’s two weeks minimum. Have tomorrow off but then back Tuesday morning ready to go for Motherwell. Yes?”

“Yes boss!” came the chorus in reply.

I left them to it, hoping they wouldn’t abuse my trust. We’d know in good time.

FULL TIME: Heart of Midlothian 1-1 Glasgow Celtic

Team: Pereira, Smith, Souttar, Haring, White, Whelan, Montolivo, Naismith, Mulraney (Walker), Washington (Wighton), Ikpeazu

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Table as at Sunday 15th December 2019

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Glasgow Rangers

16

13

2

1

44

12

41

32

Glasgow Celtic

16

12

3

1

35

11

39

24

Heart of Midlothian

17

10

3

4

35

25

33

10

Aberdeen

17

10

3

4

30

24

33

6

Kilmarnock

17

6

5

6

21

20

23

1

Motherwell

16

7

2

7

22

22

23

0

St Mirren

17

7

1

9

21

29

22

-8

Livingston

16

5

4

7

18

29

19

-11

Hibernian

17

4

5

8

23

29

17

-6

St Johnstone

17

3

5

9

19

28

14

-9

Ross County

17

2

3

12

11

29

9

-18

Hamilton Academical

17

1

4

12

12

33

7

-21

 

Friday 13th December

Rangers

3

0

Hibernian

 

Saturday 14th December

Aberdeen

5

2

Ross County

Hamilton

2

2

Kilmarnock

Livingston

1

0

St Mirren

St Johnstone

2

3

Motherwell

 

Sunday 15th December

Hearts

1

1

Celtic

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The following day, with the snow having stopped but there still being plenty settled on surfaces, I once again walked to Tynecastle, hunkered down against the bitterly cold wind that was coming in off the Forth and taking care with each individual step.

I had a day largely of admin planned, catching up on that stuff that I’ve not had a chance to so far during the month because of matches, preparing for matches, and reviewing matches.

Best laid plans and all that.

I was perhaps twenty minutes into my day when I got a call from the treatment room asking me to come down. So, I did and found Conor Washington on the treatment table. “Good evening?” I asked him.

“Aye, not so bad thanks, gaffer.”

“How’s the head?”

“It’s grand, I didn’t have too much and was off fairly early.”

“No strife then?”

“Ah, no, nothing like that, boss.”

“Would you tell me if there had been?”

His wry smile told me everything I needed to know on that score.

“You’re in for your groin?” I asked. He’d been taken off as a precaution against Celtic after tweaking a muscle at the top of his thigh which, I didn’t want to exacerbate unduly.

“Aye, that’s right. It’s pretty tight this morning, agony this morning but eased a bit as I got it moving.” He replied. “Karen’s just popped out to get some gel, she’ll be back in a sec.” And as if on cue, that’s when she burst back through the door, shoulder length dark hair tied back in a loose pony tail and her arms full of boxes and tubes.

“Jones, good to see you. How’s things?” She asked, laying down her treasure on the empty physio’s couch behind me.

“Good thanks, Kaz, and you?”

“Not so bad, not so bad.”

“How’s the invalid?” I asked.

“He’s fine. It’s only a strain and should heal quickly with plenty of rest.” She turned a hard gaze towards the top scorer who, if I didn’t know him better I’d almost say that he was colouring a little.

“Leave him out Wednesday then?”

“If you’re able to. He could get through the game ok, but there’s always the risk of the pull becoming tighter or, worst case scenario, tearing. Then we’d be talking a couple of months. If you’re able to err on the side of caution, do so.”

“That’s fine, I was going to drop him anyway.” I said. At that Conor’s relaxed demeanour changed in an instant.

“What?!” He exclaimed.

I laughed. “Just kidding, Washers, just kidding.” I returned to my conversation with the head physio. “What about the weekend?” I asked.

“We’ll get him back in on Friday and I’ll update you then.” She said.

“Excellent, thanks Kaz. Anyone else on the list for today?”

“Just Stevie Naismith for his regular post-match work and Ricci for a rub-down. That’s it. Everyone else is fit and healthy, albeit probably hungover as f-“

I laughed. “Big night was it?”

“I left at 1 and most of the boys were still going strong. Don’t worry though, Jones, no-one was overdoing it.”

That was genuinely music to my ears. I wondered if this is what it was like being a parent? Letting the kids out on their own, wondering if I’d get a call from the cops at any stage during the night or see images I didn’t want to see plastered over social media. So far, things had been satisfyingly quiet and with the trustworthy Karen providing me with reassurance, I parked that concern now.

Back upstairs I managed another half an hour or so when the phone rang, it was Jamie Walsh, an agent. He was representing Loic Damour and wanted to know if I had time for a conversation with him and his client. I was pretty sure I knew what it was about but agreed to meet the two of them at lunchtime regardless.

I called down to the canteen and asked for a couple of plates of sandwiches and suchlike sent up to the office along with some coffee. I had a fridge in the corner with big glass bottles of still or sparkling water chilling inside.

Another hour or so worth of work was completed when the intercom buzzed and Gina, my PA, announced that Loic and Jamie had arrived. “Thanks, Gina. Show them in.”

She did just that and I rose to shake hands, showing them to one of the sofas, whilst I sat on the other. “Help yourselves to something to eat, can I get you drinks?”

Pouring three cups of coffee and with Loic helping himself to a couple of wraps on a plate, making small talk for a couple of minutes, we finally got down to business.

“Okay, what I can do you for, chaps?” I asked.

Loic put his plate down and looked at Jamie. “Will you say so?” he asked.

“Sure thing,” Jamie replied in his mid-Wales accent. “So, Jones,” he said, sounding a little like Tom Jones, “Loic is a little disappointed at his lack of playing time this season.” Then a silence, as if he’d said all he needed to say.

“Is that it?” I asked eventually.

“Well, yes and no. We wanted to let you know and ask what you were planning to do about it.” Jamie replied.

“Well,” I said pausing to sip my coffee. Rich and velvety, unlike my wallet. “I appreciate you letting me know face to face rather than going through the press or anything like that. So, thank you for that.” I removed my glasses, squeezed my eyes shut and rubbed the bridge of my nose. “I understand your concerns, of course I do, players want to play, it’d be worrying if you didn’t. At the moment, though, Glenn and Ricci have a real understanding and for now, I’m not going to be breaking it up.”

“Of course, I think we recognise that, don’t we Dammy?” The Frenchman nodded. “Our bigger concern is that he’s not getting time off the bench at the moment. When was your last appearance?”

“End of October, against Ross County. I started and then nothing, not even the bench.” The midfielder stated quietly.

“That’s right, almost two months now, and you’re now picking that young lad on the bench, Irving.”

“He’s done really well when given his chance.” I said.

“You mean, I haven’t?” Loic asked.

“No, I didn’t say that, did I. You’re inferring something that isn’t there.”

“Then why aren’t you picking me?”

“I can only pick so many players, I need to make sure I have everything covered on the bench, and so far, we’ve been lucky with injuries so I haven’t needed to make as many changes as I might have expected.”

A moment of slightly strained silence followed that was broken by Jamie, eventually.

“Is Loic part of your plans here?” He asked.

“Of course he is, I just can’t sit here and make guarantees. I wouldn’t do that to any player. No-one is assured of a place in the side, they have to earn it. And once they’ve earned it, they have to make sure they work hard to keep it.” Jamie and Loic looked at each other for a moment. I half expected Jamie to ask for a moment alone with his client, but it didn’t happen.

“If you can’t offer Loic any sort of guarantee of more minutes, then we would like to formally request a move.”

This was it, this was what I’d been expecting, it came as no surprise, but I raised my eyebrows regardless. “A move?”

“Yes. I think we’d be happy with something temporary for the rest of this season, then review in the summer.”

I pursed my lips in thought, even though I’d been thinking this over for the past hour. We were already looking at the possibility of loaning out Andy Irving to continue his development and I understood Loic’s concerns and demands, especially at 29 years old. The problem was that if I let him go as well as Irving, I was potentially leaving myself a little short of cover. That said, I didn’t feel as though I could let this rumble on without making some kind of concession, I didn’t want unhappy players spreading discontent through what was a strongly united dressing room.

“Okay,” I said at last. “If I try and get you a move for the rest of the season where you can get more minutes, we’ll sit down with a clean slate at the end of May and discuss.”

Jamie and Loic looked at each-other once again. “I think we have a deal, Jones.”

“Yes, I am happy with that,” Loic confirmed. “Thank you for understanding, boss.”

“Jamie, you’re welcome to get on the phone to clubs and see if you can drum up some interest – I’m sure you have been anyway, I know what you guys are like.” A knowing look flashed across his eyes. “I’ll do the same, okay?”

We’d come to an agreement and the player left the office rather happier than he’d been when he arrived.

For me, it was back to work with yet more on my ‘to do’ list and no closer to ticking anything off.

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Wednesday 18th December 2019: Motherwell v Heart of Midlothian (SPL)

Venue: Fir Park

Att: 9,145

To be honest, that didn’t really scratch the surface of my Monday. There were a couple of conversations with John Souttar’s agent to see if he might be up for signing a contract extension – he had 18 months left to run and I was nervous about losing our prize asset, certainly in terms of market value, for peanuts. Then, Kara Warwick rang to ask me again if there was any truth in the rumour that was sticking around that West Ham were still looking to sign Aaron Hickey, we then got talking a bit about Christmas plans (I didn’t have any) and New Year plans (again, I didn’t have any) before I was rang by Leah Young to ask pretty much the same thing about Hickey. This story obviously had some legs, and I knew now that he was being watched, it seemed as though someone at the London Athletic Stadium was trying to unsettle my young full-back.

Not best pleased about that.

Anyway, I could only control things within my own realm and whatever West Ham might have wanted to do didn’t fall into that. So, I concentrated on Motherwell and returning to the scene of our League Cup exit.

Two changes, Peter Haring dropped to the bench to allow Craig Halkett come in alongside John Souttar, whilst Conor Washington’s unavailability saw Sean Clare return and Stevie Naismith moved up front to partner Uche.

The snow from the weekend had melted and been replaced by heavy rain, it was much milder but again, superb work by the groundstaff at Fir Park made sure that the pitch was in perfect condition.

It was the hosts that made the better start to things, getting the ball down on the slick surface and passing the ball well. The first opening fell their way, Chris Long from 25-yards out skidding a powerful effort off the turf and no more than a foot wide of Pereira’s right-hand upright. The goalkeeper was concerned enough to fling himself full-length, but the ball went the correct side of the post from his, and my point of view.

In the 12th minute, Ricci Montolivo floated in our first corner of the game, bang into the heart of the six-yard box. Ghosting in, as ghostily as it’s possible for a 6’5” hulk of a man to be able to, from the far post was Uche Ikpeazu and he gleefully leapt, to head home unchallenged for the opening goal of the evening. Whether that should have been dealt with by the goalkeeper or a centre-half would have been something I’d have looked at had we conceded such a goal. But as we hadn’t I simply celebrated on the touchline the striker moving into double figures for the season.

Two minutes later, with the Motherwell defence still at sixes and sevens – almost eights and nines – a cross from the right found Naismith in acres of space, but the forward was unable to keep his header down and it floated harmlessly over the crossbar and then almost immediately, another defensive error saw Uche pick the ball up and strike a shot across goal and wide.

Finally, the hosts began to settle down relieved to be just a single goal behind and not two or three. It became a tit-for-tat affair, one side swinging and then the other. On 33 minutes Liam Polworth swung the ball right for Alan Hutton to chase onto, a neat sidestep took him past Aidan White and he then hit a low snap-shot that beat Periera at his near post but rebounded off the upright and away for Souttar to clear.

A couple of minutes later and controversy reined. White won a tackle with Hutton down the left and fed the ball to Mulraney, as he got into the penalty area and looked to cross it, Allan Campbell came across and appeared, to my eye at least, to win the ball and concede a throw-in. The official, though, had spotted something else, whether he’d actually caught the winger first, I don’t know, but he pointed to the spot.

I was at the edge of my technical area screaming for the ball to be left for Ricci Montolivo to take but Sean Clare was deaf to my instructions and took responsibility upon himself. Were he to miss, there would be hell to pay!

Trevor Carson went the right way, but there was too much on the strike from Clare and it had hit the back of the net before the goalkeeper was on the floor. It wasn’t a great spot kick by any stretch, but it was enough. The former Gillingham man had his first goal of the season and at the same time, saved himself unnecessarily from feeling my wrath.

HALF-TIME: Motherwell 0-2 Heart of Midlothian

That’s how we came to lead by two goals at the break. I didn’t feel entirely comfortable even though we’d been very good in that first half. Motherwell had carried enough threat to keep us honest and I thought the next goal would be absolutely crucial. My message was simple, keep going, kill the game.

The first quarter of an hour after the restart were fairly serene, absorbing and a good watch, but lacking anything approaching fireworks. That changed on 62 minutes when Glenn Whelan’s free kick from the left was headed away from danger, partially, by Declan Gallagher. Clare and Devante Cole contested the header near the penalty spot which my player won, heading it on towards the far post where Mulraney stole in quietly and unmarked to nod home from no more than a couple of yards out.

I immediately removed Ricci Montolivo from the action, allowing Andy Irving another run out and then six minutes later made a double change at the back with Aaron Hickey and Haring replacing Smith and Souttar.

The next 20 minutes saw shots raining in at both ends, from all distances and angles – there were 45 efforts on goal during the game, 22 of which were on target – both keepers had to make saves that were comfortable, not unexpected as the outfielders tried to outdo each-other from sillier and sillier places on the pitch.

With three minutes of the 90 remaining, James Scott, who had replaced Cole up front for Motherwell, picked up the ball just inside our area and fired a stingray of a strike that was rising past Pereira, kissed the inside of the near post and rippled the roof of the net. It was a fine strike, and although not likely to be anything other than a consolation, we needed to be on our guard just in case.

Actually, it turned out we didn’t. In the 92nd minute, in a carbon copy of our first goal, Stevie Naismith, this time, ran in unmarked to head home a delivery from Irving, this time, into the net from inside the six-yard box, very much assisted by some statuesque defending to put some icing on the evening for us. And within a minute, the icing had a cherry on top of it as a free-kick forward saw Peter Hartley misjudge his header and allow Naismith in, his low strike from just inside the penalty area gave Carson no chance and our third nap hand of the season was complete.

An excellent evening’s work, back to winning ways and a bit boost to morale ahead of the festive Edinburgh derby at the weekend.

FULL TIME: Motherwell 1-5 Heart of Midlothian

Team: Pereira, Smith (Hickey), Souttar (Haring), Halkett, White, Montolivo (Irving), Whelan, Clare, Mulraney, Ikpeazu, Naismith

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Table as at Wednesday 18th December 2019:

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Glasgow Celtic

17

13

3

1

37

12

42

25

Glasgow Rangers

17

13

2

2

45

14

41

31

Heart of Midlothian

18

11

3

4

40

26

36

14

Aberdeen

18

10

4

4

30

24

34

6

Kilmarnock

18

7

5

6

23

20

26

3

Motherwell

17

7

2

8

23

27

23

-4

St Mirren

18

7

1

10

22

32

22

-10

Hibernian

18

5

5

8

25

30

20

-5

Livingston

17

5

4

8

19

31

19

-12

St Johnstone

18

3

5

10

19

30

14

-11

Ross County

18

3

3

12

14

30

12

-16

Hamilton Academical

18

1

5

12

12

33

8

-21

 

Tuesday 17th December

Hibs

2

1

Livingston

 

Wednesday 18th December

Celtic

2

1

Rangers

Hamilton

0

0

Aberdeen

Kilmarnock

2

0

St Johnstone

Motherwell

1

5

Hearts

St Mirren

1

3

Ross County

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Saturday 21st December 2019: Hibernian v Heart of Midlothian (SPL)

Venue: Easter Road

Att: 20,421

What a way to reach the halfway point of the league season. A local festive derby in Scotland’s first city and, at the same time, keeping 20,000 of Edinburgh’s finest patrons away from the shops to allow those that despise football to get their gifts and presents in peace.

Winning a derby match is what all football fans live for. Winning one on their opponent’s patch, well, that’s even better. And that was the task ahead of us on the last Saturday before Christmas as we drove across the city – the 3½ miles looking at the host of shoppers and brass bands and carol singers. This was the first year that the run-up to Christmas had largely passed me by and, if I managed to do well at this managerial lark, could well be the last one for many years to come. I always liked Christmas, I enjoyed the lead-up more than the day perhaps and my parents were both disappointed that I wouldn’t be able to make it back down South, but with training on Christmas Eve and then a game on Boxing Day, it simply wasn’t going to be feasible.

That 20 minutes or so on the coach of reflection was a nice diversion from the hurly-burly of derby day. The moment the coach was directed into the Easter Road car park, I switched back into matchday mode and the focus was on.

Our preparations had taken a knock with the news that Joel Pereira, up until now ever present, was unfit having picked up the flu and may also miss the home match with St Mirren on Boxing Day. Zdenek Zlamel came in to deputise with Kevin Silva taking the goalkeeper’s spot amongst the substitutes. Conor Washington was still unfit, so Stevie Naismith continued up front, indeed the only other changes from the thumping win at Motherwell saw Peter Haring replace Craig Halkett, who was suspended, and Aaron Hickey replaced the rested Aidan White at left-back.

An even opening 10 minutes gave way to a couple of openings to Hibs that threatened to really ignite the cauldron, the buzzing atmosphere certainly warming up the cold toes, noses and fingertips. Firstly, Melker Hallberg looped a header towards goal, but Zlamel collected comfortably, before Daryl Horgan got in behind Michael Smith, he tried to bend his shot just inside the far post but was too close to my Czech understudy who held on to his left.

We were just beyond the quarter hour when neat build-up involving Smith, Whelan and Clare saw the latter sweep the ball left for the overlapping Hickey. The youngster’s first-time cross into the box was excellent, picking out Naismith who swivelled and volleyed past Chris Maxwell, also first-time, to silence the baying hosts’ faithful and allow the cheers of our visiting gaggle of fans to reverberate around the stadium.

The next clear-cut opening came just past the half-hour mark, Hibs had been working hard to get back into the game but we were defending well, then keeping the ball well and looking to break with purpose. A free kick, fairly central but some 40-odd yards from goal was drifted in to the edge of the six-yard box. John Souttar rose highest, but Maxwell produced a magnificent fingertip save, tipping the ball onto the crossbar. It fell almost onto the head of Mulraney, no more than 2-yards out. Inexplicably, rather than nodding the ball inside the post he was stood next to, he tried to divert it inside the far post and, somehow, got it all wrong as the ball eventually drifted out of play somewhere near the edge of the penalty area. Heads in hands all round until he turned around and noticed the assistant’s flag raised for offside. Blushes spared.

Three minutes before the break after a half in which we’d been in control for the majority of, certainly since the goal, saw a Scott Allan corner delivered to the far post where Ryan Porteous outjumped Peter Haring and powered a header inches wide of the post and into the side netting. Some around the ground thought the net ripple have come from it going in, thankfully it hadn’t and we went in ahead.

HALF TIME: Hibernian 0-1 Heart of Midlothian

“Get the second goal and that’s them gone,” I said at the break. “They’re teetering at the moment, you can tell by the way they’re going last-ditch at the back. Keep knocking and I’m sure it’ll come. Well done, just keep going.”

Simple stuff really, no need to over-complicate.

Of course, within 5-minutes of the restart that had all gone out of the window.

Daryl Horgan picked up possession after one of our free kicks had been cleared and carried it mid-way into our half before Hickey, who had already been cautioned, came across and mistimed his challenge. It was a clear free kick and, unfortunately, a clear yellow card. Yellow and yellow made red and we were down to 10 men for the final 41 minutes of the encounter. Aidan White immediately came on before the restart for Jake Mulraney, as we reshuffled slightly, withdrawing the winger and asking the two full-backs to try and get forward and provide the width as best they could.

That soon led to the expected onslaught. Zlamel made a fine save from an Allan strike, after Horgan had been denied by a brilliant sliding block from Smith and then Lewis Stevenson headed over the top from a precisely delivered near-post corner kick. The next quarter of an hour or so wasn’t too bad, we were defending well and I withdrew Stevie Naismith into a more withdrawn role behind Uche, just to try and give us a little more guile going forwards because we desperately needed an outlet. The pressure that was coming our way, even though there wasn’t too much being created, would eventually take its toll.

With 20 minutes remaining, the pressure ramped up once again, Souttar briefly embodying Danny Blind and bringing the ball out of defence before embodying someone blind and aimlessly giving it away. The ball was swiftly shifted into the space that he’d vacated, in behind Whelan and Oli Shaw rather than looking to slot it past Zlamel, tried an audacious chip that drifted harmlessly wide.

Five minutes later, Tiago Alves picked up a ball from Glenn Middleton and turned on the nitro to surge past White into the box, then showed the presence of mind to cut it back for Allan. The attacking midfielder thundered an effort goalwards that would have tested Zlamel anyway, but Souttar stuck out a limb to try and block only for the ball to glance off his thigh and into the top corner of the net for a deserved equaliser for the hosts.

Three minutes later, one of our best periods of possession of the half saw the ball worked between Smith and Souttar, then back to Zlamel, he then found Berra (who had come on for Montolivo) and he sent White scampering away down the left. The cross was terrific and somehow, Uche – who was arriving at a rapid rate of knots – completely unmarked as he sent a thumping header beyond Maxwell to restore the lead and send the Jambo Army into absolute delirium.

For all of four minutes.

David Gray and Lewis Stevenson combined nicely to slip in Middleton who found himself clear on goal. His effort from an angle flew across Zlamel, who looked to go to ground a little early, and flew into the far bottom corner to silence the supporters behind the opposite goal and increase the volume ten-fold as the home fans celebrated.

Could we now hold on for a point? The place was absolutely rocking, the hosts had their dander up and we looked shot to pieces. It was all hands on deck, a six man defence as Whelan and Haring got deeper and deeper, in fact we all got deeper and deeper, defending our 18-yard line and leaving Uche to vainly feed off scraps. Time ticked away with each minute feeling like an hour and each second feeling like a minute. But, just through pure graft and hard work, through putting bodies on the line and working for each-other, the boys held out. Many collapsed to the floor in exhaustion at the final whistle and after I shook hands with Jack Ross, I waited for them to give each man a pat on their back for their efforts.

In the dressing room, a crestfallen Aaron Hickey was waiting for us as we all filed in. “Sorry lads, I let you down.” He said.

“Aaron, it’s a lesson learned today. Things like that happen in a split second, I’m not going to haul you over the coals for it. It’s done, you miss the St Mirren game and we move on. We’re in this together, right boys?”

There was a chorus of agreement and it was good to see a couple of the older lads having a little chat with the 17-year old full-back as they got changed, reassuring him and giving them the benefit of their experience. A nice touch.

The point kept us two points ahead of Aberdeen, who had also drawn with Kilmarnock and 3rd in the table at the halfway point of the campaign. That was very much my focus for the second half, finish where we were now and cement European football for next season.

FULL TIME: Hibernian 2-2 Heart of Midlothian

Team: Zlamel, Smith, Souttar, Haring, Hickey, Montolivo (Berra), Whelan, Clare, Mulraney (White), Naismith, Ikpeazu

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Table as at Sunday 22nd December 2019:

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Glasgow Celtic

18

14

3

1

40

13

45

27

Glasgow Rangers

18

14

2

2

46

14

44

32

Heart of Midlothian

19

11

4

4

42

28

37

14

Aberdeen

19

10

5

4

30

24

35

6

Kilmarnock

19

7

6

6

23

20

27

3

Motherwell

18

8

2

8

25

27

26

-2

St Mirren

19

7

1

11

22

33

22

-11

Hibernian

19

5

6

8

27

32

21

-5

Livingston

18

5

5

8

20

32

20

-12

St Johnstone

19

3

5

11

20

33

14

-13

Ross County

19

3

4

12

15

31

13

-16

Hamilton Academical

19

1

5

13

12

35

8

-23

 

Saturday 21st December

Celtic

3

1

St Johnstone

Hibernian

2

2

Hearts

Kilmarnock

0

0

Aberdeen

Ross County

1

1

Livingston

St Mirren

0

1

Rangers

 

Sunday 22nd December

Motherwell

2

0

Hamilton

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Thursday 26th December 2019: Heart of Midlothian v St Mirren

Venue: Tynecastle

Att: 17,536

Scottish football goes weird at Christmas. Maybe it was just 2019, but half of the Christmas programme was played on Christmas Eve with the other half on Boxing Day. Of course, I was fully used to Boxing Day football south of the border, but not Christmas Eve. Thankfully, the SPL fixture computer had left us until the day after Christmas meaning that the lads would be focused on not overindulging at the dinner table and also, I thought, give us a better chance of not having a half empty stadium. Christmas Even football just felt weird.

For the visit of St Mirren, who had lost their four previous matches ahead of this one, I was still without Joel Pereira, who had a hacking cough, so Zdenek Zlamel retained his place in goal whilst Aidan White returned at left-back for the suspended Aaron Hickey and Conor Washington returned up front with Sean Clare dropping out and Stevie Naismith dropping back into the attacking midfielder (or deep lying forward) role.

Abderdeen’s 3-0 win over Livingston had seen the Dons overtake us into 3rd place in the table, so I was at pains to stress to the boys the importance of this one and to get us back above our rivals, beginning the second half of the campaign as we meant to go on.

The conditions were nigh-on biblical but once again, the pitch was in perfect condition. As soon as I’d arrived at Tynecastle, I’d gone down into the bowels of the main stand and left a card and huge bottle of scotch in Jocky’s little hideaway. Attached was a little box of 25 miniatures as well, each one different, that he could work through at his leisure. He’d done us proud just as he’d done all season.

We began well, Montolivo picking up a ball midway inside our half and firing a beauty of a pass into space for Uche to open his legs and get onto. He got into the penalty area but rather scuffed his effort and Vaclav Hladky was able to make a comfortable stop.

After that things turned rather attritional as St Mirren, clearly lacking confidence with the ball, did their best to disrupt us in possession, and they did it well for twenty minutes or so. On 28 minutes, however, Glenn Whelan picked up possession after Michael Smith’s cross had been headed clear and sent the ball out to the left where White had come steaming up on the overlap. Taking a touch, he then fired the ball low across Hladky and just inside the far post for his first goal of the season, giving us the lead in the process. He topped off his celebration with a cartwheel, which was a brave move given the conditions, and a bow at the corner flag. Such a showman!

The game reverted to type, us controlling the ball, St Mirren looking to disrupt us and get to the break only the one goal behind. On 43 minutes Ricci Montolivo’s corner was headed back across goal by Uche for Jamie Walker to have his effort blocked on the line. It rebounded nicely for Montolivo and he slipped the ball to his right for Craig Halkett. The centre half’s first effort was blocked but the rebound fell to him 10-yards out, his finish inside the far post was beautifully measured and much more becoming of a seasoned centre-forward than rugged stopper. Still, didn’t matter. 2-0 and we were well in control at the interval.

HALF TIME: Heart of Midlothian 2-0 St Mirren

Once again, ‘more of the same!’ was the message at the break. I felt a chance to go on and get more goals whilst it was very hard to see how the Saints were likely to get themselves back into the game.

Of course, a minute and a half into the second half, a Ross Wallace corner kick was met by Danny Mullen at the near post and his header flashed narrowly over the top, perhaps sanding a coat of paint off the frame of the goal as it did so and the warning was served.

In the 52nd minute, the Montolivo / Uche axis combined once again, the former sending the latter scampering through once again, the big striker’s effort was much better than his first half one had been, but Hladky made a fine save to keep his side above water and breathing. Two minutes later the Czech keeper came to his side’s rescue again with another fine save to his left, this time after White had picked up possession and released Washington, the top scorer’s goal drought looking as though it might reach five matches.

63 minutes had gone and further opportunities to extend our lead had been wasted when Halkett intercepted a ball into our penalty area. His pass back to Zlamel was far too short and Mullen was able to nip in and slip the ball into the corner of the net to reduce the arrears, once again we’d been made to pay for casual defending at the back. We really needed to cut out these defensive errors before better sides started to punish us rather more than sides lower down the table.

Within two minutes, we should have restored our two-goal advantage, but Uche headed over with a free header from inside the six-yard box from a Montolivo corner, before we managed to settle things down a little for 15 minutes or so.

There were twelve minutes remaining when the Italian maestro, who had been outstanding once again for us, pulling the strings and prompting us from his midfield playmaking position, sent Naismith away this time with an adroit ball through the middle. The Scotsman beat Hladky but alas, his radar was slightly awry and the ball went the wrong side of the post.

In spite of the close scoreline, to the boys’ credit, they didn’t show too many nerves and saw the remaining time out professionally and relatively comfortably. In stoppage time another chance to increase the margin of our advantage went begging, once again Montolivo was the creator, once again Naismith the wastrel, once again Hladky making an excellent save.

“We have to be better at both ends,” I said to the boys afterwards. “More clinical in front of goal and for heaven’s sake, cut out that casual nonsense at the back. Carry on like that, and we’ll fall behind Aberdeen and end up in the bun-fight to finish top six.”

We’d been pretty comfortable, and I never really felt as though we were likely to throw points away, but I really felt that some minds could do with re-focusing ahead of our Sunday afternoon visit to Ross County, a game we’d be expected to win.

FULL TIME Heart of Midlothian 2-1 St Mirren

Team: Zlamel, Smith (Brandon), Souttar, Halkett, White, Whelan, Montolivo, Naismith, Walker, Ikpeazu (Meshino), Washington

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Table as at Thursday 26th December 2019

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Glasgow Celtic

19

15

3

1

43

14

48

29

Glasgow Rangers

19

15

2

2

48

14

47

34

Heart of Midlothian

20

12

4

4

44

29

40

15

Aberdeen

20

11

5

4

33

24

38

9

Kilmarnock

20

7

7

6

25

22

28

3

Motherwell

19

8

3

8

27

29

27

-2

St Mirren

20

7

1

12

23

35

22

-12

Hibernian

20

5

6

9

28

35

21

-7

Livingston

19

5

5

9

20

35

20

-15

St Johnstone

20

4

5

11

23

34

17

-11

Ross County

20

3

4

13

15

33

13

-18

Hamilton Academical

20

1

5

14

13

38

8

-25

 

Tuesday 24th December

Aberdeen

3

0

Livingston

Rangers

2

0

Ross County

St Johnstone

3

1

Hibs

 

Thursday 26th December

Hamilton

1

3

Celtic

Hearts

2

1

St Mirren

Kilmarnock

2

2

Motherwell

 

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Sunday 29th December 2019: Ross County v Heart of Midlothian (SPL)

Venue: Global Energy Stadium

Att: 5,997

The year ended with a trip to Dingwall to meet the division’s second worst side in the first half of the campaign, Ross County in what was also the final game before the three-week SPL winter break. We did have a couple of matches in that period, friendlies at home to German side Augsburg and Turkish giants Besiktas before we were to resume with a Scottish Cup 4th round tie at Annan Athletic.

Before all of that though, I really wanted us to finish the year with a bit of a flourish. We’d come a long way in the five and a half months since I’d joined the club and now looked like a good SPL side, I felt we could lay good claim to being ‘best of the rest’ ahead of Aberdeen and behind the Old Firm.

I made several changes to the side, some enforced, others less so. Joel Pereira returned in goal whilst John Souttar missed out through suspension having picked up his fifth yellow against St Mirren. Peter Haring came into the back-four alongside Craig Halkett to provide us with a little bit of ability to pass the ball from the back. Further forward, Ryo Meshino got a rare start down the left causing a reshuffle. Jamie Walker shifted inside and Stevie Naismith partnered Conor Washington up front, Uche Ikpeazu dropping to the bench.

The weather was once again shocking, wet and windy and most of all, cold. Not that the hosts minded. 105 seconds was all it took for a goal-kick to be headed on by Iain Virgus for Billy McKay to have the freedom of our half to stride forward unchallenged – not one of my back four looking to engage him – and then slip the ball between Pereira and his vacant near post (the goalkeeper’s positioning gave me nightmares!) to provide Ross County with the early advantage.

Totally dumbstruck.

Twenty minutes later, a corner from the right-wing was headed on by an unmarked McKay for Keith Watson to crane his neck and head his effort against the underside of the crossbar and down on, thankfully not over, the goal line.

These were the highlights of that first half. In which we barely got out of our own half. We were absolutely battered by the hosts who really didn’t capitalise on just how woeful we were. The final ball often lacked and when it did find a blue shirt, the finish failed to test Joel Pereira. We should have been 3 or 4 down at the break.

HALF TIME: Ross County 1-0 Heart of Midlothian

Silence in the dressing room at the break.

I looked at my watch. “Right lads, 45 minutes or so to save your Hearts careers. If I ever see a half like that in my time here,” I said evenly, “not one of you f-ers will play for this club again. And I’ll see to it that you’ll struggle to find a club at this level next time around To a man you’ve been a disgrace. JD,” I turned to my coach, “Throw that f-ing tea down the sink. Karen,” I turned to the physio, “Empty those bottles. These f-ers deserve none of that.”

Two minutes into the second half, Glenn Whelan curled a free kick around the wall and saw it come off the face of the upright with the goalkeeper beaten. The rebound fell to Washington, but Marian Kelemen was up on his feet quickly and made a superb block.

Better, much better.

In the 54th minute, a nice move saw the ball worked from left to right, Walker feeding it out to Michael Smith. At first it looked like the full-back had got his cross all wrong, drifting it behind Naismith, but arriving was Washington on time and he powered his header back across Kelemen and into the far corner to bring us level and ending his goal drought with his 16th goal of the season. 1-1, and the way in which we lined up again suggested we meant business.

As it happened, we switched off and a neat ball over the top caught us out. Vigurs was sent clear through the inside left channel and only a superb save by Pereira, pushing the ball over the crossbar prevented the hosts from re-taking the lead. That led to a little spell of pressure from the hosts that we had to meet with stoic, and at times desperate, defending, but we rode out the storm.

So much so that frustration grew within the Ross County ranks and they picked up four bookings inside three minutes for misdemeanours all borne of frustration rather than malice, but it signalled a shifting of the tide, the changing of the guard.

And on 61 minutes Whelan sent a free kick across to the far post where it was met by Halkett, who nodded easily home from a couple of yards out for his second goal in consecutive games and also handed us the lead.

We were completely on top now, Washington went off to be replaced by Uche whilst Jake Mulraney came on for the ineffectual Meshino.

White knocked a ball over the top for Naismith to pounce upon, fairly central to goal he beat Kelemen with his effort but pulled his shot a little and it went wide of the goalkeeper’s right-hand post – meanwhile the hosts’ frustration was growing. Two more players entered the book either side of an Ikpeazu volleyed finish that was ruled out for offside, from another Whelan delivery into the box from a set piece.

It only delayed the inevitable by 8 or 9 minutes as Walker won possession in a dual on the right touchline and sent a long ball forward for Uche. He outpaced his marker and although his attempt at the cute failed, Kelemen blocking his first effort, he then leathered it into the back of the net from a ridiculously tight angle to complete the comeback and secure his 12th goal of the season.

I still wasn’t happy after the game, refusing to say much to the players beyond “see you all Friday.” I had been half tempted to cancel a couple of their four days off but I knew that once the dust had settled, I’d look back and be quite content with a return of 14 points from 7 matches during the hectic month of December. I hoped that our slovenly approach to the first half had been borne simply of mental fatigue and nothing more that I had to really worry about and, to be quite honest, I needed the chance to recharge my batteries too.

We finished the year in 3rd place and well placed to kick-on and cement it during the year 2020 and, with a bit of luck, enjoy a run in the Scottish Cup as well.

FULL TIME: Ross County 1-3 Heart of Midlothian

Team: Pereira, Smith, Haring, Halkett, White (Hickey), Whelan, Montolivo, Walker, Meshino (Mulraney), Naismith, Washington (Ikpeazu)

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Table as at Sunday 29th December 2019:

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Glasgow Celtic

20

16

3

1

45

14

51

31

Glasgow Rangers

20

16

2

2

52

15

50

37

Heart of Midlothian

21

13

4

4

47

30

43

17

Aberdeen

21

12

5

4

34

24

41

10

Kilmarnock

21

7

7

7

25

24

28

1

Motherwell

20

8

3

9

27

30

27

-3

St Mirren

21

8

1

12

25

36

25

-11

Hibernian

21

5

7

9

29

36

22

-7

Livingston

20

5

5

10

21

39

20

-18

St Johnstone

21

4

5

12

24

36

17

-12

Ross County

21

3

4

14

16

36

13

-20

Hamilton Academical

21

1

6

14

14

39

9

-25

 

Sunday 29th December

Celtic

2

0

Kilmarnock

Hibernian

1

1

Hamilton

Livingston

1

4

Rangers

Motherwell

0

1

Aberdeen

Ross County

1

3

Hearts

St Mirren

2

1

St Johnstone

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The following day, whilst the players and most of the staff were having a lay-in and readying themselves for Hogmonay, I was once again in the office at Tynecastle working. Taking calls from agents wanting to flog their players in the January transfer window even though, to be quite honest, I was interested in bringing anyone into the club unless I really had to. I was really happy with the make-up of the squad and would rather try and save any investment until the summer transfer window at which point I’d have a better idea of knowing where we’d need to strengthen, particularly with some of the loanees that were out, for example Leo Watson, having had a full season, I’d be able to assess them on their return.

I’d circulated a couple more names around the scene as being available for loan, Loic Damour was now officially listed whilst I’d done the same for Andy Irving, as I felt he could benefit from regular first-team minutes, and a couple of promising lads in the age group sides. There continued to be a lot of chatter surrounding Aaron Hickey, but certainly nothing official from anywhere, I really wanted to keep hold of him for the rest of the season if at all possible but were we to receive a really good offer from a Premier League club, it’d be hard to resist. The club weren’t in the position to be turning down strong offers given that it was losing money hand over fist on a weekly basis.

In addition, I had a draft of a new contract ready for John Souttar, one that’d provide him with a fair pay rise and also add in a minimum fee release clause. I was angling for about £8.5million for that, in the hope that it’d put of the old firm but encourage sides south of the border to potentially pick up a bargain. The guy was a class act at the back, elegant, unfussy and excellent on the ball. The archetypal modern centre-half. The fact that he loved Hearts was in our favour and I was relatively confident, with him having 18-months left on his existing deal, that he’d re-sign.

There was one other contractual issue that was beginning to rear its ugly head – my own. I had five months left on my one-year deal and I hadn’t heard anything about any intentions from the club to offer me an extension, something that I found somewhat curious.

In my monthly catch-ups with Ann I’d not been told of any overriding concerns about my performance, and that they were happy with the direction the club seemed to be heading in. So I thought, thinking about it rationally, they might be keen to try and extend my stay at the club. I’d always believed that the first move should come from the club and that I wouldn’t agitate for a new deal. If none was forthcoming and my services were no longer required, then so be it. But, I hoped they did want me to stick around, I was really enjoying my time at the club and after a slightly sticky start, felt as though I was beginning to prove myself.

When I had nothing else to do I was trying to plot ways of closing the gap between us and the Old Firm in a sustainable way that wasn’t going to ruin the club. I’d effectively come up with a three-point plan that would need a little tweaking as we went along.

1)      Never finish lower than 3rd in the table. That would always bring with it Europa League Football and the potential to earn much needed funds through that route.

2)      Reach the last four or better of domestic cup competitions on a regular basis. Although in the short-medium term that’d likely be as best we could do in terms of pushing for honours, it would show potential signings that we were ambitious and looking to push-on, close that gap and for the right player, that could be an attractive package

3)      Pick up outstanding youngsters from bigger European clubs in the 18-21 age bracket on one or two-year loan deals, a maximum of two per season that could provide an extra injection of quality to help push us up a level, valuable first team minutes for the players and hopefully move us forward that way. If they had a similar impact to that Joel Pereira was having, we’d be heading in the right direction.

There were obviously clauses and sub-clauses involved as well and I also wanted to integrate more youngsters starting next season from our own youth setup into the first team mix. Andy Irving was leading the way along with Anthony McDonald, but I knew there were a number of other boys that given the right schooling and pathway, could make a significant impact in the first team.

Away from football, there was one of my least favourite evenings of the year to navigate, New Year’s Eve, or Hogmonay as the Scots celebrated. For me, a new year was just the same as any new day but so many liked to make a big deal of it. I’d often reluctantly be at a friend’s house and slink off quietly at midnight to avoid any of that Auld Lang Syne tosh that did nothing other than make me cringe. Indeed, I was quite looking forward to an evening of a pretentious French Noir film from Mubi and a quiet beer, noise cancelling headphones on and just avoiding the hullaballo going on outside. A phone call had put paid to that, however.

“Jones, it’s Leah.”

“Hey, Leah, how’s things? I didn’t see you at Ross the other day. Were you back in England for Christmas?”

“Yeah, I was on leave for a couple of days, came back this morning.”

“Did you have a good Christmas? Are the family well? Your Dad?”

“It was so lovely, thank you. Dad is recovering well, thanks, we spent the morning with him before heading home for dinner. How was yours?”

“The day itself was delightfully quiet, thanks. Either side the usual footballing mayhem.” I replied.

“You picked up six points didn’t you? Against St Mirren and Ross, a really tidy end to the year.”

“Yeah, we did. We didn’t play especially well in either game, I think tiredness was catching up with us a little but also the first half on Sunday was an embarrassment, the boys weren’t on it at all.”

“Did you have to deliver a half-time rocket?” She asked.

I laughed. “No, I just told them a repeat would see the lot of them bombed out of the club in the transfer window and left them to it while I found myself a nice quiet cuppa with Jocky, the groundsman who we’d brought up with us as a Christmas treat.”

“Oh, Jocky! Haha, yes. Did he liven your cuppa up with a nip from his hip flask?”

“I didn’t feel the biting wind so much after the break if that’s what your asking.”

A chuckle reached me from the other end of the line. “Listen – what are you doing tomorrow evening, Jones?”

“Nothing much, just me a couple of films and a beer.” I responded. There followed a little pause. “Why do you ask?” I ended up following up with.

“Well,” Leah said, the hesitation in her voice abundantly clear. “A load of the journos are having a get together at Kevin Boyle’s place, and there’s a little work gathering as well but between you, me and any Russian wiretaps, I’m not big on New Year’s Eve.”

“I hear that,” I said. “Me either, hence my date with Alain Delon.”

“Oh,” Leah’s tone dropped. “I didn’t realise you had company. Don’t worry.”

I laughed. “No, Alain Delon was a French actor from the 60s and 70s, I was just going to watch a couple of his films tomorrow evening.”

“Ooh!” Leah joined in with the laughter. “I thought he was.., I mean I didn’t know you were..,”

“Haha, he’s not and I’m not,” I replied, reading between the lines.

“Well, I was wondering,” Leah ventured, composing herself, “whether you might fancy coming over for dinner. I just thought since I’m here on my own and I thought you might be too. I don’t make a bad chilli, meat of veggie, either / or. I mean, no pressure or anything, I know you had plans, just thought maybe it’d be nice.”

It did sound good, although I’d have to give up a night with Alain, the company with a fellow non-reveller was quite appealing, as was the promise of chilli.

“How would you cook the chilli?” I enquired.

“Slow cooked.”

Boy, this was music to my ears.

“We could watch a film after dinner if you fancied, or talk football, or you can head off.” She added.

I emptied the final mouthful of coffee from by Catford Cat mug.

“Sure, why not. You cook, I’ll bring the wine.” I said.

“Great – anything that’s not a Merlot works for me.”

I didn’t know what a Merlot was, but I kept that quiet, not wishing to out myself as a vino noob. We made the final arrangements and after hanging up, I reached for the remote control. Finding Mubi, I selected La Cercle Rouge. As it loaded I walked to the fridge, pulled out a can of Neck Oil, poured it into a glass and sunk onto the sofa.

“24-hours earlier than planned, mon Alain, take it away mon ami.

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Sunday 19th January 2020: Annan Athletic v Heart of Midlothian (Scottish Cup 4th Round)

Venue: Galabank

Att: 2,455

The New Year came and went, what went on behind closed doors remained behind closed doors, suffice to say Leah’s chilli hit the spot and my choice of vino went down similarly well.

The next two and a half weeks saw plenty of hard work on the training ground, a couple of friendlies (4-1 win against Augsburg and 4-2 reverse to Besiktas), John Souttar put pen to paper on a new 4-year deal that set his release fee at £10million – a deal that I thought was excellent for both the player and the club. As a regular Scotland international, it was unlikely that Souttar would remain at the club for those 4-years even if we did manage to begin to close the gap to the top 2, but it did mean that as and when he did go, that the club would benefit with a hefty transfer fee.

There was no movement in terms of any major transfer deals although I remained confident of getting Loic Damour and Andy Irving out on loan, there remained plenty of talk around Aaron Hickey’s future with West Ham remaining heavily linked, but also noise of Crystal Palace and Southampton also nosing around. Still, no firm news was good news as far as we were concerned, and he remained a full part of my plans.

The competitive action of 2020 kicked off on the third weekend with a visit to Annan Athletic, who were trying to mount a promotion charge in the Scottish League 2nd Division, the 4th tier. The game was being broadcast live by BBC Scotland as part of their Scottish Cup coverage at Galabank and whilst I made one or two changes from what would be deemed our strongest eleven, it was still a decidedly strong side that took to the field to kick off our FA Cup challenge.

It took just 8 minutes for any neutral hopes to be dashed. A free kick from Glenn Whelan was swung into the far post where Christophe Berra rose to head across goal. Sliding in was Ryo Meshino, given a rare chance to impress on the left-flank, and he guided the ball into the waiting net with his second goal of the season.

Five minutes later and the on-loan Manchester City winger was denied a second when he latched onto Peter Haring’s ball forward, outstripping the frantically back-pedalling home defence, his low shot beat Aaran Taylor’s dive, but struck the base of the post before going behind for a goal kick.

Taylor then produced a quite brilliant save from a powerful Craig Wighton header after he found himself unmarked from an Andy Irving corner but that delayed the inevitable for only three minutes. Irving was again involved, picking out Uche Ikpeazu with a peach of a pass, inviting the striker to charge into the penalty area and despatch his effort beyond Taylor and into the net off the inside of the post to double our advantage.

Meshino headed over from a Jamie Brandon cross before the lead went into unassailable territory. Meshino swung the free kick in and Berra thundered his header against the crossbar, as it fell invitingly for Wighton, he was literally mugged off by Uche who lunged in, took the ball off his teammate’s toe and poked it into the empty net for his 14th goal in all competitions. I’ll admit to allowing myself a little chuckle on the bench, we’d been on at Uche to show a little bit more of a ruthless streak in front of goal, slide-tackling a teammate wasn’t quite what we’d had in mind. Still, it didn’t matter who scored, that was 3-0 inside half an hour and we were purring.

Just outside half an hour, another Irving pass split the Annan defence asunder and sent Meshino clear. Once again the Japanese winger was just too quick for the covering defenders, he shifted the ball onto his right foot and drove the ball low across Taylor into the far corner of the net to make it 4-0.

Game, set and match.

A thoroughly professional 32 minutes had sealed our place in the 5th round.

Three minutes before the break, Irving once again released Meshino, this time the winger perhaps took a touch too many, telegraphed his effort and Taylor blocked well at his near post. There was to be no first half nap hand.

HALF TIME: Annan Athletic 0-4 Heart of Midlothian

“Two things, boys.” I said at the break. “Really good first half, super professional. Well done, you’ve killed the game nice and early. Play without pressure now, don’t worry too much about going for the throat, keep the ball, entertain and most of all, protect yourselves.” That was it, as simple as that. The game was won, I didn’t really have any great desire to bury Annan, they’d been magnificent hosts and the welcome we’d received was warmer than any we’d received so far on our travels – not that we’d been made to feel unwelcome anywhere else, just there was an extra level at Galabank.

We knocked the ball around nicely, but without really looking like scoring, our intensity and tempo had dropped enormously. I left the same eleven on for the full 90 minutes, and with 17 minutes remaining, Wighton seized on some defensive indecision inside the Annan penalty area and was left with a sitter to make it 5-0. He really should have scored and I could tell after the game he was replaying the miss over and over in his mind, to be fair to Aaran Taylor, the save he pulled off was outstanding – he had no right to make it, but yes, Wighton should have scored.

With 9 minutes remaining the French striker Christian Nade, formerly of Hearts and about three dozen other clubs, found himself in behind the two centre-halves and with an opportunity to score a consolation goal for the hosts. His finish was a delicious dink over Pereira yet, he got a fraction too much purchase on the ball and it thudded off the frame of the goal and away for Aaron Hickey to bring away.

That was pretty well that, warm handshakes all round at the end, I made sure our players respected all four sides of the ground before heading back up the tunnel. Afterwards it was home-made neeps and tatties for our post-match meal, which went down a treat with most of the boys, one or two inquisitive looks from the likes of Meshino and Montolivo.

A thoroughly satisfying afternoon and, we found out the following day when the draw was made, it set up an Edinburgh derby at Tynecastle in round 5!

FULL TIME: Annan Athletic 0-4 Heart of Midlothian

Team: Pereira, Brandon, Haring, Berra, Hickey, Irving, Whelan, McDonald, Meshino, Ikpeazu, Wighton

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Wednesday 22nd January 2020: Heart of Midlothian v Livingston (SPL)

Venue: Tynecastle

Att: 19,094

League football began the following midweek, as with December, the games were coming thick and fast with five league fixtures crammed in between our two Scottish Cup ties. It’s unfathomable that the best part of a third of the SPL season was shoehorned into a 10-week period between the beginning of December and second weekend of February, a 10-week period that allowing for the winter break was actually truncated to 7-weeks – a dozen league matches in 7-weeks. In mid-winter. In Scotland.

Thank the Lord for global warming!

Aberdeen’s 3-0 defeat at Ibrox the previous evening had given us the perfect opportunity to pull away from the Dons in third place and extend the gap to five points. I suspected we’d need that extra buffer with Rangers and then the Dons next to come. Livingston gave us the chance to provide that little cushion.

All the big hitters returned, only Uche Ikpeazu, who was suspended and Craig Halkett, who had a knock were missing from the squad meaning that Stevie Naismith partnered Conor Washington up front, otherwise we were at what I thought was my strongest available eleven.

In grim conditions, more wind and rain in this never-ending winter of squalor, we made a fine start. We’d only just entered the third minute of the game when Jamie Walker shifted the ball inside for Jake Mulraney who’d come in off the left flank. That allowed space for Aidan White to gallop into on the overlap and Mulraney found him with a neat reverse pass. White looked up, delivered the perfect cross into the near post for Washington to meet first time, veritably leathering the ball with his left foot high into the roof of the net beyond the startled Matija Sarkic to give us the early advantage.

The perfect start.

That settled us into a rhythm that Livingston were at full tilt keeping up with. On the quarter hour mark, Naismith chipped the ball forward for Washington and although the striker was beaten in an aerial challenge by Alan Lithgow, he reacted quickest, seizing on the loose ball inside the penalty area and firing a right-footed strike on the half-turn across Sarkic into the bottom corner of the net to make it 2-0. Washington was absolutely on one, two strikes of the highest quality.

Within five minutes he should have completed a 16-minute hattrick, played through by Walker but this time, to be fair, he was denied by a fine save from Sarkic who stood up well and pushed his effort behind for a corner.

Still, we were rampant and giving the home fans a real show in the opening quarter.

A couple of minor alarms sounded around the half-hour mark as firstly Chris Berra got caught underneath a ball forward allowing Lyndon Dykes a clear view of goal, the winger on his weaker foot horribly scuffed his effort wide of the post, before the same man was denied, twice, by outstanding blocks from Berra after a corner into our box caused a little mayhem.

“F-s sake! We were cruising and now this!” I exclaimed angrily on the bench. “F-ing get them going again Macca.” I instructed my number 2, and Austin leapt up from his seat trying to get us switched back on.”

It didn’t really happen.

HALF TIME: Heart of Midlothian 2-0 Livingston

“First 25 minutes, outstanding boys. They couldn’t live with you and we looked a properly good side. Then I don’t know what happened, you took the foot off the throttle, started sitting back and looked as if they’d dragged you down to their level.” I said at the break. “Agreed, Austin?” I looked at my assistant.

“Aye, the gaffer’s right lads. Started great, then ya dinnae get tight enough for the last 20 and looked a right f-ing shower.”

“All it needs is for them to grab a goal back and all of a sudden we’re nervous and making unforced errors. Don’t let it happen. Clear?”

Mumbles of assent.

“Clear?!” I roar.

“Yes BOSS!” comes back the chorus.

“Hmm, better.” I uttered. “Come on boys, go again second half and make sure we don’t pass this opportunity up.”

We did redouble our efforts after the break, a superb move down the right that began with Ricci Montolivo breaking up a Livi attack, saw Michael Smith’s ball delivered to the far post. Mulraney was just beaten to the ball by a defender, but Aidan White followed up and sent a fizzing drive just wide of the post and thudding against the stanchion behind the net.

A couple of minutes later saw us survive another scare as Lithgow headed a free kick against our post and I immediately made a double change, Peter Haring replacing the tired looking Glenn Whelan in midfield and Ryo Meshino on to provide some fresh legs out wide for Jake Mulraney.

The move paid dividends, we got into a rhythm once again with Montolivo beginning to dictate things from the middle of the park. On 64 minutes, some metronomic passing saw the ball worked forward and from right to left for White, his ball into the near post was searching for Washington. The striker was favourite to get onto it, but he was unceremoniously bundled over by Ricki Lamie. A heartbeat or two before the whistle came and the point to the spot from the man in the middle. Penalty.

Jamie Walker generously deferred the responsibility to Washington, giving the Ulsterman the chance to complete a hattrick.

Washington went down the middle, the goalkeeper moved to go one way, saw where the ball was going and shifted the other, getting down just a fraction too late. He got a strong hand to the ball but couldn’t keep it out. By hook and by a little bit of crook, Washington had gotten his treble and ran off to celebrate his 19th goal of the campaign in front of the fans massed behind the goal.

I felt a lot easier as Sarkic collected the ball from the back of his net, much more forgiving of the boys easing off in the final quarter with the three points in the bag.

“Well done, Con,” I said as I signed the matchball for the hattrick hero in the dressing room after the game. “A little lucky to have this though, aren’t you? Almost bodged the spot kick.”

“Never in doubt, boss, gave him the eyes didn’t I!” the striker replied with a wink and smile.

Despite the minor stresses, it had been a comfortable evening overall and I went to face the press with a little spring in my step and smile on my face ahead of the bigger tests to come.

FULL TIME: Heart of Midlothian 3-0 Livingston

Team: Pereira, Smith (Hickey), Souttar, Berra, White, Whelan (Haring), Montolivo, Walker, Mulraney (Meshino), Naismith, Washington

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Table as at Wednesday 22nd January 2020:

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Glasgow Celtic

21

17

3

1

46

14

54

32

Glasgow Rangers

21

17

2

2

55

15

53

40

Heart of Midlothian

22

14

4

4

50

30

46

20

Aberdeen

22

12

5

5

34

27

41

7

Kilmarnock

22

8

7

7

27

24

31

3

Motherwell

21

8

3

10

27

31

27

-4

St Mirren

22

8

2

12

25

36

26

-11

Hibernian

22

5

7

10

29

38

22

-9

St Johnstone

22

5

5

12

25

36

20

-11

Livingston

21

5

5

11

21

42

20

-21

Ross County

22

3

4

15

16

37

13

-21

Hamilton Academical

22

1

7

14

14

39

10

-25

 

Tuesday 21st January

Rangers

3

0

Aberdeen

St Johnstone

1

0

Ross County

 

Wednesday 22nd January

Hamilton

0

0

St Mirren

Hearts

3

0

Livingston

Kilmarnock

2

0

Hibernian

Motherwell

0

1

Celtic

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Saturday 25th January 2020: Heart of Midlothian v Glasgow Rangers (SPL)

Venue: Tynecastle

Att: 20,099

A third meeting with Rangers of the season signalled the beginning of the 3rd and final round of matches before the league split in half for the final few weeks of the season. The Gers were still in fine form and chasing silverware on three counts having already secured the League Cup, hard on Celtic’s heels as we began to move towards the business end of the campaign. Every point either side of the Old Firm divide dropped between now and the middle of May could prove absolutely crucial when things were done and dusted.

I felt confident, I had a feeling that we’d get something from the game. We’d come a long way from the awful showing in our opener against the same opponents almost six months before, we were unbeaten in seven in all competitions and I really fancied us to provide a little upset to Steven Gerrard’s sides hopes.

Craig Halkett was fit, so he returned to the side in place of the suspended Christophe Berra, Uche also returned to the bench whilst Sean Clare came in for Jake Mulraney, I thought his industry might give us a little more than the Irishman.

It took all of 19 seconds for my confidence to be dented. Rangers kicked off and moved the ball from back to front and left to right with the supreme confidence of a side at the top of their game. Sheyi Ojo sent a cross in from the right flank where it was met on the volley by Alfredo Morelos, his effort beat Pereira all ends up but rebounded off the upright. Aidan White became the first Hearts player to touch the ball as he hacked the ball clear for a corner kick. From the corner, the clearance fell for Ojo on the edge of the box but he shot a yard wide of the post.

“Still confident?” A voice came from behind me. It was Austin. I turned around, raised my eyebrows and puffed out my cheeks. 49 seconds that had felt like 49 minutes.

As the heavens opened, again, we dug in and got a foothold in the game, passing the ball nicely. It was all in front of our opponents though, they looked far more dangerous than we did when they were in possession. A ball that fizzed across our 6-yard box was eventually worked back to Joe Aribo, but his effort was too high and ended up in the Hearts fans behind Joel Pereira’s goal.

19 minutes on the clock and another superb move from the visitors from back to front saw James Tavernier pick out the run of Ryan Kent in between Michael Smith and John Souttar. The former Liverpool winger took his effort as the ball dropped first time and was desperately unfortunate to see it strike the outside of the post and behind for a goal kick, Pereira once again beaten.

Our first real sniff of goal came in the 28th minute, Aidan White did really well to cut out a cross from the left and sent the ball clear from danger. Conor Washington picked up possession with his back to goal in the centre circle, held it up well and laid it back to Jamie Walker. The winger spotted the run of former Rangers man Stevie Naismith spinning off his marker and played him in. As Naismith struck, Nikola Katic made a splendid recovering challenge, blocking the effort at full stretch and conceding nothing more than a corner kick.

That opening gave us confidence and four minutes later, terrific work by White not only saw Ojo dispossessed, but he looked up and sent the ball into space in behind Connor Goldson for Washington to get onto. Clear through on goal, the in-form striker’s finish was going in, but Alan McGregor got down to his left to make an excellent save, pushing the ball wide for a corner. From Montolivo’s flag kick, Souttar blasted a free header from 6-yards out badly off target. Such a golden opportunity to break the deadlock.

We were the better side now, a flowing move of our own saw Glenn Whelan pick out Washington, who’d stolen in behind Goldson again, sadly his finish lacked its usual conviction and McGregor held on, plunging to his left.

There were 8 minutes remaining in the first half when arguably the best chance of the period went begging. Dmitri Folquier’s clearance in the left-back area only found Jamie Walker who headed the ball down for Washington, with the freedom of the penalty area only 8-yards out on his left foot. His effort shouldn’t have given McGregor the chance to make the save, the net should have bulged but the Scottish international got down really well to his left and tipped the ball behind at full stretch.

“For f-s sake!” I lamented. “How many f-ing chances do we need?!”

We had them on the run, we’d weathered the storm and as Souttar once again met the corner, this time heading straight at the grateful McGregor, having done that, we should have been punished the Gers for their own profligacy and errant defending.

HALF TIME: Heart of Midlothian 0-0 Glasgow Rangers

“Last 20 minutes, you’ve played them off the park, boys.” I said at the break. “They can’t live with you. You weathered the storm, got a bit of a luck, but we should be a couple of goals up. You just need to be better in front of goal, show a little more conviction and belief and the game’s there for the taking.”

It wasn’t, Rangers were far tighter after the break and although we shaded possession, we didn’t do enough with it to force much in the way of opportunities, try as we might. That said, Rangers were nothing like the threat going forward that they’d been in the opening 20 minutes and what had been a thrilling advert for the SPL in the first 45-minutes had become something more of a stalemate after the interval.

That said, I found the encounter fascinating and absorbing, the time drifted on quickly.

With 17 minutes remaining, our defence was split for the first time by a ball from substitute Rhian Brewster that sent Morelos in behind Halkett. His shot was well blocked by Pereira but the goalkeeper’s strong hands sent the ball against Michael Smith. It rebounded off the alarmed full-back and in spite of the scrambling efforts of John Souttar, agonisingly rolled over the line and into the net for the most painful of own goals as Morleos wheeled away as if he’d just fired one in first time from 30-yards.

What an absolute sickener, a real sucker-punch.

Credit to the boys, they retained their belief and ten minutes later, after a period of concerted pressure, Aidan White nicked a lovely ball in for substitute Jake Mulraney who had found space down the left. He stood the ball up to the edge of the 6-yard box where it was met by the head of fellow substitute Uche Ikpeazu. I thought it was in, McGregor was beaten, but alas the ball hit the underside of the crossbar and came down a yard the wrong side of the line and was hooked away from danger by Goldson.

And that was our final chance, our final opening. We’d absolutely given as good as we’d got and but for that freak rebound, would have come away with a thoroughly deserved point.

Steven Gerrard wore a relieved look on his face at the end. “Jones, hard luck. We got away with one there.”

I shook his hand, with a rueful smile. “We’ve had the ball run for us plenty this season, Steve, hopefully that’ll show the boys the value of being clinical in front of goal. Good luck for the rest of the season.”

Back in the dressing room the spirits were low. I took a moment before talking and kept tings short.

“Boys, you’ve just gone toe to toe with a very good side there, but for that freak bit of luck and a little more composure in front of goal we’d be coming away with a point, maybe all three. Remember this feeling, dust yourselves down and let’s take it out on Aberdeen on Tuesday night. Okay? Get changed and get upstairs, relax. Good effort everyone.”

There was a modicum of good news, Celtic and Aberdeen had drawn 1 each at Parkhead meaning that our cushion over Tuesday’s opponents was 4 points, even a defeat (not that I was countenancing such a thing) would see us maintain our 3rd spot. The jubilation from the visiting changing room told you all you needed to know about their prospects, their win had taken them above their city rivals and now top of the pile.

FULL TIME: Heart of Midlothian 0-1 Glasgow Rangers

Team: Pereira, Smith, Souttar, Halkett, White, Whelan, Montolivo, Clare (Mulraney), Walker, Naismith (Ikpeazu), Washington.

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Table as at Saturday 25th January 2020:

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Glasgow Rangers

22

18

2

2

56

15

56

41

Glasgow Celtic

22

17

4

1

47

15

55

32

Heart of Midlothian

23

14

4

5

50

31

46

19

Aberdeen

23

12

6

5

35

28

42

7

Kilmarnock

23

9

7

7

30

24

34

6

Motherwell

22

9

3

10

33

32

30

1

St Mirren

23

8

2

13

25

39

26

-14

St Johnstone

23

6

5

12

27

37

23

-10

Hibernian

23

5

7

11

30

44

22

-14

Livingston

22

5

5

12

22

44

20

-22

Ross County

23

3

4

16

17

40

13

-23

Hamilton Academical

23

2

7

14

17

40

13

-23

 

Saturday 25th January

Celtic

1

1

Aberdeen

Hamilton

3

1

Ross County

Hearts

0

1

Rangers

Kilmarnock

3

0

St Mirren

Motherwell

6

1

Hibernian

St Johnstone

2

1

Livingston

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Tuesday 28th January 2020: Aberdeen v Heart of Midlothian (SPL)

Venue: Pittodrie

Att: 19,429

Sometimes you’re at a game and you’re mighty relieved just to come away with something, limit the damage and forget it ever happened. This freezing cold, frosty, snowy Tuesday night on Scotland’s North Sea coast was one of those nights. Almost everything that could have gone wrong did.

The original coach picked up a puncture on departure from Tynecastle setting us back a good 45-minutes or so on the journey northwards during which the weather significantly worsened. I won’t lie, I had visions of us arriving at Pittodrie and being told to turn around straight away. All credit to the ground staff, once again, who had performed a minor miracle in producing a surface that was soft enough to take a moulded stud and stood up well throughout the evening.

One change saw Uche return to the starting line-up in place of Sean Clare, Stevie Naismith dropping into the whole and the 14-goal hitman partner Conor Washington up front.

Things continued to unravel just 7 minutes into the game when Jamie Walker went over on his ankle almost in front of us on the bench. There was no crack, which augured well in terms of there being no break of fracture, but even by the time Karen Gibson had gotten his book and sock off, it was twice the size it ought to have been. He was straight off and taken to hospital for an immediate X-ray. On came Ryo Meshino ahead of Jake Mulraney, I felt he deserved a run after his impressive performance in the Scottish Cup at Annan.

Four minutes later, Michael Smith lost possession on the right flank in a challenge with Craig Bryson and the Aberdeen midfielder strode forward with the ball before playing in one of Aberdeen’s three out and out strikers, Connor McLennan to run onto. He coolly drew Pereira before tucking the ball beyond him and into the bottom corner of the net to open the scoring.

We struggled to get to grips with the conditions and the opponent’s shape, Washington had an effort from a Meshino cross well blocked whilst at the other end Bryson volleyed wide from the edge of the box, the one thing we did have was Meshino’s low centre of gravity proving useful on the slippery surface.

Finally, on 24 minutes we created something of note, Montolivo sent a cross in from the left that was glanced goalwards by Naismith. Joe Lewis was beaten, but the ball bobbled just past the far post. Agonisingly close.

A brief flash, as it turned out for six minutes later, Lewis Ferguson dinked a lovely ball in behind Aaron Hickey for Shay Logan to run onto. Unchallenged he got into the penalty area before seeing his powerful shot well tipped over the bar by Pereira.

Naismith went close again with a header as the game opened out into an end-to-end affair, Lorand Fulop fired forcefully straight at Pereira who held on well before Uche was released by a fine ball by the influential Naismith, clear on goal he did everything right except find the net, Lewis making a quite brilliant save to preserve the Dons’ advantage.

Three minutes before half-time, a break was led by Meshino down the left flank, he fed the ball into Washington, who timed his run to perfection to break the offside trap. His low angled effort beat Lewis all ends up, struck the inside of the base of the far post and somehow rebounded out where it was smuggled clear by a red shirt. Once again, the run of the ball deserted us and we went into the interval trailing.

HALF TIME: Aberdeen 1-0 Heart of Midlothian

I was at a little of a loss as to quite what to say at the break. There was no questioning the effort and we’d certainly grown into the game as it went on. I ended up just urging a little more quality at either end of the pitch, to keep believing and get something from the game.

Just before the hour mark, Sean Clare came on for Uche and Stevie Naismith moved up front alongside Conor and a few minutes later, Clare held the ball up well, found Michael Smith who picked out the run of Naismith. The former international drove into the penalty area, fired his effort low and true towards the far corner, only to be denied by the dive of Joe Lewis at full stretch, turning the ball wide of the post.

For the next couple of minutes we were camped in the Aberdeen half, at least four excellent crosses fizzed across their penalty area without anyone able to apply the final touch and I hunkered further down into by tan coloured overcoat, expecting the worst to play out.

Clare, who was making a real impact, then sent Washington scampering through on goal in behind the Aberdeen back four, once again though the imposing frame of Joe Lewis got the better of the striker and he spread himself to make another fine smothering save to keep the hosts ahead.

I had to keep the belief. We had to keep the belief.

With twenty minutes remaining, Aberdeen lifted the siege as McGinn played a gorgeous ball in for Sam Cosgrove who had a clear path to goal. His shot was on target, but Pereira emulated his opposite number flying at full stretch to his right to push the effort away with a strong arm before Smith and Whelan completed the clearance. A second goal would have killed us at that point.

There was 14 minutes remaining when Aaron Hickey drove a crossfield pass over the top of the Aberdeen back four for Naismith to get onto. Driven wide by a defender, the former Everton man showed superb presence of mind to look up and cut the ball back for Ryo Meshino, who had absolutely bust a gut to get into the penalty area. The pass was so good, it took out two defenders and the goalkeeper leaving Meshino only to hit the target. He did and duly scored the equaliser to spark mild chaos behind the goal amongst the visiting supporters.

There was one more sting in the tale which didn’t affect the result, mercifully, but wasn’t good news. In stoppage time, Ricci Montolivo dislocated his knee-cap as he twisted, caught his foot in the surface. Karen managed to pop it back into place and he made the journey back on the coach with a brace on his knee and on crutches. Not a good look for one of my most influential players. Both he and Jamie Walker, who was back from hospital with a diagnosis of damaged (not torn) ligaments.

“About four weeks for both of them,” Karen replied when I asked for an early prognosis.

“Bugger.” I sighed. “Ah well, let’s get the hell out of here and home.”

With everything that had gone on, to come away with a point was a fair old effort. Some long hard thinking would need to be done before we met Hamilton at the weekend.

FULL TIME: Aberdeen 1-1 Heart of Midlothian

Team: Pereira, Smith, Souttar, Halkett, Hickey, Whelan (Haring), Montolivo, Naismith, Walker (Meshino), Ikpeazu (Clare), Washington

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Table as at Tuesday 28th January 2020:

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Glasgow Rangers

23

19

2

2

60

15

59

45

Glasgow Celtic

23

18

4

1

50

15

58

35

Heart of Midlothian

24

14

5

5

51

32

47

19

Aberdeen

24

12

7

5

36

29

43

7

Kilmarnock

24

10

7

7

31

24

37

7

Motherwell

22

9

3

10

33

32

30

1

St Mirren

23

8

2

13

25

39

26

-14

St Johnstone

24

6

5

13

27

41

23

-14

Hibernian

24

5

7

12

30

47

22

-17

Livingston

22

5

5

12

22

44

20

-22

Hamilton Academical

23

2

7

14

17

40

13

-23

Ross County

24

3

4

17

17

41

13

-24

 

Tuesday 28th January

Aberdeen

1

1

Hearts

Hibs

0

3

Celtic

Rangers

4

0

St Johnstone

Ross County

0

1

Kilmarnock

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Statistics at end of January 2020

Results

Date

Venue

Opposition

Comp

Score

17/07/2019

H

Alloa Athletic

LCGB

2-0

21/07/2019

A

Cowdenbeath

LCGB

2-0

24/07/2019

H

Elgin City

LCGB

5-0

27/07/2019

A

Arbroath

LCGB

0-0*

04/08/2019

H

Glasgow Rangers

SPL

0-3

11/08/2019

A

Aberdeen

SPL

1-2

20/08/2019

A

Motherwell

LC2

0-1

23/08/2019

A

St Johnstone

SPL

5-2

31/08/2019

A

Kilmarnock

SPL

2-2

14/09/2019

H

Hamilton Academicals

SPL

2-1

20/09/2019

H

Motherwell

SPL

4-1

28/09/2019

A

Glasgow Celtic

SPL

1-1

04/10/2019

A

St Mirren

SPL

3-1

18/10/2019

H

Hibernian

SPL

2-1

26/10/2019

H

Ross County

SPL

1-0

29/10/2019

A

Livingston

SPL

3-2

09/11/2019

H

Aberdeen

SPL

3-0

22/11/2019

A

Glasgow Rangers

SPL

2-4

30/11/2019

H

St Johnstone

SPL

2-1

04/12/2019

A

Hamilton Academicals

SPL

2-1

07/12/2019

H

Kilmarnock

SPL

1-2

15/12/2019

H

Glasgow Celtic

SPL

1-1

18/12/2019

A

Motherwell

SPL

5-1

21/12/2019

A

Hibernian

SPL

2-2

26/12/2019

H

St Mirren

SPL

2-1

29/12/2019

A

Ross County

SPL

3-1

19/01/2020

A

Annan Athletic

SC4

4-0

22/01/2020

H

Livingston

SPL

3-0

25/01/2020

H

Glasgow Rangers

SPL

0-1

28/01/2020

A

Aberdeen

SPL

1-1

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Appearances / Goals

   

League

Scottish Cup

League Cup

Total

   

A

S

G

A

S

G

A

S

G

A

S

G

Whelan

Glenn

24

0

0

1

0

0

4

0

0

29

0

0

Pereira

Joel

22

0

0

1

0

0

5

0

0

28

0

0

Souttar

John

23

0

0

0

0

0

4

0

0

27

0

0

Washington

Conor

21

1

15

0

0

0

5

0

4

26

1

19

Smith

Michael

23

0

0

0

0

0

3

0

0

26

0

0

White

Aidan

20

1

1

0

0

0

4

0

0

24

1

1

Montolivo

Riccardo

21

1

0

0

0

0

2

1

0

23

2

0

Walker

Jamie

18

3

4

0

0

0

3

1

1

21

4

5

Ikpeazu

Uche

17

4

11

1

0

2

2

1

1

20

5

14

Mulraney

Jake

17

3

7

0

0

0

3

2

2

20

5

9

Halkett

Craig

13

2

2

0

0

0

2

0

0

15

2

2

Berra

Christophe

7

4

1

1

0

0

4

0

0

12

4

1

Naismith

Steven

11

1

5

0

0

0

0

0

0

11

1

5

Clare

Sean

7

4

1

0

0

0

3

1

0

10

5

1

Hickey

Aaron

5

8

0

1

0

0

1

0

0

7

8

0

Meshino

Ryo

4

9

1

1

0

2

1

1

1

6

10

4

Haring

Peter

5

4

0

1

0

0

0

0

0

6

4

0

Damour

Loic

2

4

0

0

0

0

2

1

0

4

5

0

Irving

Andy

2

3

0

1

0

0

1

2

0

4

5

0

Brandon

Jamie

1

2

0

1

0

0

2

0

0

4

2

0

Wighton

Craig

1

4

2

1

0

0

0

0

0

2

4

2

Zlamel

Zdenek

2

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

2

0

0

MacLean

Steven

0

4

0

0

0

0

1

3

0

1

7

0

McDonald

Anthony

0

2

0

1

0

0

0

0

0

1

2

0

Bozanic

Oliver

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

1

0

0

1

0

 

Record

 

Home

Away

Total

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

P

W

D

L

F

A

P

W

D

L

F

A

SPL

12

8

1

3

21

12

12

6

4

2

30

20

24

14

5

5

51

32

Scottish Cup

0

0

0

0

0

0

1

1

0

0

4

0

1

1

0

0

4

0

League Cup

2

2

0

0

7

0

3

1

1

1

2

1

5

3

1

1

9

1

Total

14

10

1

3

28

12

16

8

5

3

36

21

30

18

6

6

64

33

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The January transfer window came to an end (I had a good half-hour discussion with Leah about Sky Sports’ insistence that it ‘slammed’ shut, not to mention the countless other tedious elements of the coverage) at literally the worst possible time. A Friday afternoon the day before a game, so when I should have been fully focused on preparing for the visit of Hamilton less than 24-hours later, I was on the phone to agents, to Dunfermline, to Motherwell, to West Ham, to Ann trying to finalise three outgoing deals.

Why leave it so sodding late?

In the case of Andy Irving, who went to Dunfermline on-loan for the rest of the campaign, and Loic Damour who moved to Motherwell on a similar basis, their availability had been known for weeks. Why wait until five or six hours until the deadline passed to try and get something in place?

As for West Ham. They spent all morning lodging all sorts of derisory offers for Aaron Hickey that were rejected out of hand whilst I had his agent on the phone barking about his client’s desire to speak to the London club. Finally, at 1:20pm they lodged a seven-figure bid, with a handful of add-ons that would take his eventual fee in excess of £2million assuming the clauses were met and I gave the youngster the green light to discuss personal terms with the Hammers.

I was hacked off at the attempted powerplay by messrs Gold, Sullivan and Brady, I was hacked off at Hickey’s agent. I’d asked if we could loan him back until the end of the season, a not unreasonable request I thought considering the abject tardiness of their offer when newspaper tittle tattle had linked the teenager with a move south all month and beyond.

“Oh, no, we couldn’t possibly consider that,” came the reply.

“Why not?” I asked.

“Hearts don’t fit our vision.”

“In what way?”

“We’d consider a move to one of the Old Firm, but we feel Aaron should be playing rather higher than the equivalent of League 1 level.”

The snotty arrogant a-holes.

Although we had no time to bring in any sort of replacement, I just wanted the deal done by that point. Aaron, who’d acted properly throughout the entire pantomime, was whisked from Edinburgh Airport down to London City Airport and then he hightailed it out to Chadwell Heath for a medical. I knew there was no way he could turn down the move so, with about 6 minutes before the deadline passed the final bits of paperwork were exchanged and lodged with the relevant FAs, international clearance had been received and Aaron Hickey joined West Ham for an initial fee of £1million.

No sooner had the new broken and the phone rang. It was Leah.

“Hello, Young. What can I do for you?”

“You sound harassed, Jones, busy day?”

Silence.

“What can I do for you?”

She laughed. “Well, the messageboards are going into meltdown over Aaron Hickey’s sale. The natives are restless, anything for them?”

“On the record or off?”

“Let’s go on first.”

“Okay, nobody – least of all me – wants to see players as highly rated and with as much potential as Aaron leave the club. We received a good offer from the player and he signalled that he wanted to speak to West Ham to further his career. There are a number of other good youngsters here at the club and give time and patience, I’m confident one or two of them will develop into excellent players for the football club.”

“Great, thanks for that Jones. You’re okay with that going on air? I recorded it.”

“Sure thing, whatever you need.”

“And now off the record?”

“Have you switched off your mic?” I asked.

“Of course, come on, you should know by now I don’t do that kind of sh-, least of all to you!”

“Yeah, sorry,” I said, “it’s been a long and tiring day and I haven’t even begun to think about tomorrow yet. Off the record, I hope West Ham get royally f-…”

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Saturday 1st February 2020: Heart of Midlothian v Hamilton Academical (SPL)

Venue: Tynecastle

Att: 18,591

February began then with us rather less better off personnel wise than we had been four days before. No Montolivo, no Walker, no Hickey. In addition to that, Michael Smith had a knock and was only really fit enough for a place on the bench at best for the visit of strugglers Hamilton Academical. Themselves and Ross County were in dire straits at the bottom of the table, however the Accies had picked up their second win of the campaign the week before their visit to Tynecastle, overcoming their fellow strugglers 3-1 to keep their survival hopes alive.

Jamie Brandon then came in for only his fifth start of the season at right-back whilst Peter Haring came in alongside Glenn Whelan in midfield and Ryo Meshino a long-deserved start down the left. There was some audible discomfort amongst the support around the events of the previous 24-hours, something I noticed when I took my seat as those behind me were deep in conversation around the wisdom of selling Hickey ‘for such a snip’ (paraphrasing here, the actual terminology was rather more rudimentary). As tempting as it was to engage with them – politely and respectfully to fill them in with the full facts, I knew from experience that trying to reason with football fans was often a pointless exercise. Best to let them have their opinions and hold one’s counsel.

We began like a bit of a train, Brandon seized on a poor goal kick by Owain Fon-Williams, surged 35-odd yards into the penalty area before the goalkeeper redeemed himself with a fine save from the young full-back’s effort. The rebound fell for Meshino, he pulled it back for Aidan White to cross, but a defender got in front of Uche Ikpeazu and conceded the corner.

Within a minute, a long clearance forward from Souttar saw a suspiciously offside looking Uche on the edge of the penalty area and he needed no second invitation to plant his 15th goal of the season beyond Fon-Williams into the bottom corner of the net. Even he looked nervously at the linesman, but there was no flag and he was free to celebrate. It’s fair to say there was mild fury amongst the Accies players and I certainly had plenty of sympathy for them. It wasn’t until I watched Sportscene that I noticed the visitor’s right-back just playing Uche on, all credit to the official.

It wasn’t difficult to see why the Acccies found themselves in such trouble at the wrong end of the table, they were criminally easy to open up, we’d noticed that a simple ball from back to front would see their back four at sixes-and-sevens with one or two defenders pushing up and the others dropping deep, or vice-versa. Such a ball from White released Washington and Fon-Williams made a fine block before the visitors broke for the first time from our own corner, Mikael Miller superbly turning Brandon, who had gotten far too tight, haring into the penalty area before firing straight at Pereira.

That little alarm aside, we were completely on top. The only thing missing was the second goal. Two minutes before the break, we got a golden opportunity, a cross into the box saw Scott McMann tussle with Uche and the big striker go down. The official saw enough there to award a penalty kick. With Jamie Walker crocked and Sean Clare n the bench, Glenn Whelan stepped up to take responsibility. The kick was well enough struck, but it was too close to Fon-Williams – half the reporters covering the game would probably have used the words ‘nice height for a keeper’ – but the Welshman deserves nothing but credit for a superb save that kept his side alive at the break.

HALF TIME: Heart of Midlothian 1-0 Hamilton Academical

“You know what I’m going to say, lads.” I began my little half-time chat looking around at the faces, each one’s attention fixed upon me. “Anyone? Yes, Conor.”

“Be more ruthless, more clinical, take our chances, boss.”

“Exactly that,” I said. “We’re going to get more chances this afternoon, let’s take them and put some air between us and Aberdeen again, yes?” The Pittodrie club had beaten St Johnstone the evening before to move within a point of us and I wanted to remove any pressure around our league position. “Otherwise, very good boys, well done. More of the same.”

Our start to the second period was less explosive than the first, it was on 62 minutes that we created our first good chance of the half, a number of half-openings had been created and gone unconverted, Jamie Brandon was slipped in down the right flank and his cross was met by a defensive head. It fell to Stevie Naismith about 15-yards out on the angle and as it dropped, he left the floor and unleashed a scissored volley right-footed in mid-air which beat Fon-Williams but crashed back off the crossbar.

The rebound fell to White, he took a touch and sized up his options. In something that I showed to the younger lads the following week, Naismith was alert and this time he guided his volley inside the near post and beyond Fon-Williams for his sixth goal of the campaign. All too often when denied a spectacular goal, players still have their heads in their hands for the next phase, Naismith was immediately finding himself a little pocket of space and reaped the reward handsomely.

That helped us breathe a little more easily, although in the immediate aftermath we relaxed way too much and Marios Ogkmpoe was sent through a cavernous gap in our back four before shooting weakly at Pereira and then Miller seized on an uncharacteristic hesitation by Souttar to wriggle clear, only to see his effort comfortably fielded by the Portuguese goalkeeper once again.

He immediately rolled the ball out to Craig Halkett, who in turn found Aidan White and the left-back fired a ball down the left for the substitute Jake Mulraney to run onto. Into the penalty area unchallenged, his left-footed effort left Fon-Williams rooted, but the ball rolled just the wrong side of the far post.

After that mad five minutes, things settled down again and as we approached the final ten minutes, another poor Fon-Williams goal kick was collected by a home shirt, this time Uche. He found Souttar who then exchanged a couple of passes with Brandon, making progress down the right flank. The right-back then played a neat one-two with Naismith to take McMann out of the game and his cross was superbly glanced into the far corner at the near post by Uche.

This time the flag was straight up, even though to the naked eye he looked level with the last defender at least as he headed in. Once again, the replay on the evening highlights showed what a superb decision the assistant had made, Uche was no more than half a yard offside when the cross came in, but offside he was and the goal didn’t count.

A comfortable win then, deserved and a mini relief after a couple of winless games, it’s always good to arrest any mini dip in form before they begin to bloom and play on people’s minds. Job done.

FULL TIME: Heart of Midlothian 2-0 Hamilton Academical

Team: Pereira, Brandon, Souttar, Halkett, White, Haring (McDonald). Whelan, Naismith, Meshino (Mulraney), Ikpeazu, Washington (Wighton)

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Table as at Sunday 2nd February 2020

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Glasgow Rangers

24

20

2

2

63

15

62

48

Glasgow Celtic

24

19

4

1

53

17

61

36

Heart of Midlothian

25

15

5

5

53

32

50

21

Aberdeen

25

13

7

5

37

29

46

8

Kilmarnock

25

10

7

8

31

27

37

4

Motherwell

23

10

3

10

36

33

33

3

St Mirren

24

8

2

14

26

42

26

-16

Hibernian

25

6

7

12

33

48

25

-15

St Johnstone

25

6

5

14

27

42

23

-15

Livingston

23

5

5

13

23

47

20

-24

Ross County

25

3

4

18

19

44

13

-25

Hamilton Academical

24

2

7

15

17

42

13

-25

 

Friday 31st January

Aberdeen

1

0

St Johnstone

 

Saturday 1st February

Hearts

2

0

Hamilton

Livingston

1

3

Motherwell

Rangers

3

0

Kilmarnock

St Mirren

1

3

Hibs

 

Sunday 2nd February

Ross County

2

3

Celtic

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Tuesday 4th February 2020: St Johnstone v Heart of Midlothian (SPL)

Venue: McDiarmid Park

Att: 6,421

The need to manage my resources effectively was really beginning to bite, a number of players were a way off 100% fitness the weather was as inclement as always – our midweek trip to Perth was going to be a real test of character, just like the visit to Aberdeen had been a week before. I had to shuffle the pack with the big Edinburgh derby looming in the Scottish Cup at the weekend and that also necessitated a little shift in shape as well.

Michael Smith returned at right-back with Jamie Brandon dropping to the bench, whilst in midfield Glenn Whelan missed out for the first time in the league, he badly needed a rest. In came 18-year old Anthony McDonald for his first league start under by stewardship and I shifted him into a wide midfield role, the kind of one David Beckham used to perform – not an out and out winger but providing some width out on the right-hand side. It was a bit of a gamble, I’ll freely admit.

Further forward Sean Clare came in for Conor Washington, who dropped to the bench – Stevie Naismith moved up to partner Uche up front, whilst down the left Ryo Meshino and Jake Mulraney swapped places, the latter replacing the former in the starting line-up for his first start in a fortnight.

McDonald really threw himself into things, picking up a caution in the first minute of the game for a mistimed challenge and rather set the tone for the evening. It was the first of 11 cautions dished out by an official who did nothing to let the game flow. To be fair, the players on both sides were equally guilty with their increasingly niggly and tedious approach to the evening.

In the 9th minute, Sean Clare played the first of umpteen measured passes as he really flourished in the attacking playmaker role, serving up a lovely ball for Mulraney to race onto. The winger’s left footed strike was repelled well by Zander Clark in the home goal, the ball falling kindly for a defender to complete the clearance.

That was literally it for actual watchable football in a first half that stunk to high heaven. Naismith almost forced home a scramble after a corner in the 43rd minute, but Clark fell on the ball. Clare was trying to rise himself amidst the abject misery and looked a class apart, but he was a lone bright light in a sea of drivel.

HALF TIME: St Johnstone 0-0 Heart of Midlothian

“Bloody hell, lads,” I said at the break. “That was desperate. One positive, we’re not losing, but my sweet lord. You’re being dragged down to their level. I know it’s hard going, I know you’re tired, but you’re a heck of a lot better than that level of toss you’ve just served up. The fans’ll be demanding refunds if you keep that up, and rightly so. Knuckle down, work hard and don’t fall into the trap of matching them.”

I spent some time going around the boys on an individual basis just to give them a little bit of a pep talk and encouragement. I didn’t want to go in too hard, they’d worked hard all season and were continuing to do so, but I knew there was a bucket load more quality in them that we needed to show.

We were better after the restart, Clare once again played Mulraney in with a pass that was inch-perfect, the winger cut back onto his weaker right foot though and fired over before in the 51st minute, McDonald swung a corner kick in that was met on the run by Uche Ikpeazu, and his header flew beyond Clark and into the back of the net to give us the lead.

I really thought that would settle us down fully and that we’d go on to really play some football, dictate the play.

It didn’t. To the Saints’ credit they dug in, redoubled their efforts and literally scrapped for every ball, making life really difficult for us. Once again, we were dragged into the battle and quite honestly, they were much better and cuter at it than we were. The yellow card was brandished on countless occasions as any promising break by either team was ended with a trip or tug of the shirt.

With a quarter of an hour remaining, a free kick from the left flank, about 15 yards inside our half set up a rare spell of St Johnstone possession where they passed the ball. Michael O’Halloran exchanged a neat one-two on the edge of our box to take Aidan White out and the Saints winger fired a low shot just beyond the dive of Pereira and inside the far post to bring the two sides level.

Conor Washington, who entered the fray with 20 minutes remaining, did wonderfully well to work himself an opportunity, turning his man on halfway and then only being denied by a good stop from Clark. Again, though, that effort with 2 minutes remaining was a rare bright spot on a dismal evening.

A point gained? Not really. Two points dropped? Again, not really. I took no pride at all from the game. One to quickly forget and move on to the weekend Cup derby.

FULL TIME: St Johnstone 1-1 Heart of Midlothian

Team: Pereira, Smith, Souttar (Berra), Halkett, White (Brandon), Haring, McDonald, Clare, Mulraney, Ikpeazu (Washington), Naismith

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Table as at Wednesday 5th February 2020:

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Glasgow Rangers

25

21

2

2

67

15

65

52

Glasgow Celtic

25

19

5

1

53

17

62

36

Heart of Midlothian

26

15

6

5

54

33

51

21

Aberdeen

26

13

8

5

38

30

47

8

Kilmarnock

26

11

7

8

34

27

40

7

Motherwell

24

11

3

10

38

34

36

4

St Mirren

25

8

3

14

26

42

27

-16

Hibernian

26

6

8

12

34

49

26

-15

St Johnstone

26

6

6

14

28

43

24

-15

Livingston

24

5

5

14

23

50

20

-27

Ross County

26

3

4

19

20

46

13

-26

Hamilton Academical

25

2

7

16

17

46

13

-29

 

Tuesday 4th February

Hibs

1

1

Aberdeen

St Johnstone

1

1

Hearts

 

Wednesday 5th February

Celtic

0

0

St Mirren

Hamilton

0

4

Rangers

Kilmarnock

3

0

Livingston

Motherwell

2

1

Ross County

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Saturday 8th February 2020: Heart of Midlothian v Hibernian (Scottish Cup 5th Round)

Venue: Tynecastle

Att: 20,099

“How many shots did we have overall?” I asked JD.

“The final count came in at 16, boss.”

“But the only effort on target was Uche’s?”

“That’s right.”

I offered JD, Foxy and Austin a bottle of beer from the fridge I kept behind my desk, each man took one.

“Thoughts?”

Myself, and the outfield coaches were sat together in my office after the departure of our cross-city rivals.

Once again, it had been a full house at Tynecastle and a febrile atmosphere. We were as close to full strength as we could muster, with various players unavailable, and there was a first call-up to the first-team squad for 17-year old left-back Leo Watson, another player who looked to have a very bright future ahead of him.

We’d begun the game voraciously, a superb move in the 4th minute in the never-ending dismally inclement conditions, stretched down the right flank and when Michael Smith’s cross back to the edge of the penalty area was met on the half-volley by Aidan White, the ball rising no more than 6-inches over the crossbar, it looked as though we had rediscovered our mojo after the midweek stalemate in Perth.

In the 20th minute we’d gone ahead with a well worked set-piece that saw Glenn Whelan’s free kick from the left-edge of the penalty area headed back across goal at the far post by Conor Washington allowing Uche Ikpeazu to stab the ball home from three yards out. It was the striker’s 17th goal of the season and he’d scored for the 3rd consecutive game. Hibs were rocking, no question and the strike ramped up the expectation amongst the home support.

That was it for the first half, we’d been in control and fully warranted our 1-0 lead. Neither goalkeeper had been extended after we took the lead but I was less concerned by that at this point than I usually would have been, purely because of what was at stake and the tension around the tie.

HALF TIME: Heart of Midlothian 1-0 Hibernian

There’s no need to repeat my half-time words for you here, they were along the same lines as normal. Well done, make sure you take any chances that come your way and stay tight at the back. Simple as that.

Watson came on at the break for White, who had tweaked an abductor muscle, as a precaution and we began the second half as we had the first. Five minutes after the restart, Mulraney got down the left flank and saw his cross narrowly headed over the top by Ikpeazu. Given the striker’s form, I think most of us expected the net to bulge.

Three minutes later a simple ball through the middle of our defence caught us out and Florian Kamberi found himself inbetween the two centre-halves, muscling through on goal. Pereira stood up well, didn’t commit and when Kamberi went to slip the ball beyond him, spread himself superbly to deflect the ball away from goal.

That was the signal for the visitors to get on top for 25 minutes or so. Again, Pereira wasn’t unduly stretched, but our ball retention suffered enormously even though efforts were still flying high and wide of the Hibs goal.

With 10 minutes remaining, we were undone. A free-kick inches outside the penalty area saw Stevie Mallan step up and curl the ball beautifully around the wall and just inside the post, into the top corner to bring Hibs deservedly level.

“I dunno what to say, boys.” I said after the game looking around the room. “You’ve set yourselves a certain standard this season, you’ve been very good, but the last couple of matches has fallen way short of what we expect. Of what they expect,” I pointed outside, “those loyal folk that have been following you and supporting you unreservedly all season.”

I started to pace around the room. “One thing we’ve had in almost every game, even those against the Old Firm, has been a goal threat. We’ve looked like scoring goals and we’ve worked the oppo goalkeeper. Almost without fail, we’ve made sure the oppo goalkeeper has earned his wages for the week against us. Today, I think they could have had Nicola Sturgeon playing in net for them. Jimmy Krankie, even.”

I got to the entrance of the shower, paused, turned around and started to pace back the other way. “I’m disappointed, lads. Tuesday I gave you a bit of a free pass. Today wasn’t anywhere good enough. We’re missing far too many chances, today I think the only one on target was Uche’s goal. We’ve got to improve and improve quickly. Bugger off home, rest up tomorrow, there’s no midweek match this week so you can expect an intense few sessions before next weekend on the training pitch. And have a little think, yeah? Each and every one of you, just about where you can make that 5% improvement in your game to get you back to where you have been.”

***

“It’s not a case of not creating chances,” Foxy ventured. “We’re still creating openings, what was it Tuesday, JD, 23 shots?”

“Aye,” JD nodded.

“39 shots across the two matches. Only seven have made the keeper work.”

“Or gone in,” Austin interjected.

“Aye,” Foxy said. “Or gone in.”

“So, what’s the issue, then?” I asked. “If we’re creating chances but hitting the target with less than one in five efforts, what are we talking about? I mean, it’s tough to lay the blame at Uche’s door right now, the kid’s got three in three and looks a danger every time he gets the ball in and around the box.”

“Conor’s not looking as sharp thought is he?” Austin said quietly.

“Seems a bit churlish to start laying the blame at the feet of someone who’s got 19 so far this season, and we’re not at the middle of February yet.” I countered.

Austin took a swig from his bottle. “Aye, he’s been great. But, he’s not looked like scoring in what, his last four or five? That chance late on at St Johnstone, he did superbly to turn his man but when it was time to pull the trigger that instinct wasn’t there, he was overthinking it, caught between two decisions, go for power, go for precision. In the end he did neither.”

“So, what, he’s lacking a bit of confidence?”

“Looks like it.” Austin confirmed.

“Do you two agree?” I asked JD and Foxy.

“Seems so to me,” JD replied. Foxy nodded his agreement.

“Okay, so our hitman is lacking confidence, I’ll go along with that.” I said. “How do we manage that then? Give him a rest? Drop him, try and get him to play through the barren spell and work with him in training? You were a striker, JD, what worked for you?”

“He wouldn’t know, his barren spell lasted 18 years,” Foxy bantered, bringing a laugh around the room.

“Different players react differently, boss. For me, I wanted to keep playing but you’ve got to think of the team as a whole. I mean, is Conor still contributing to the team without goals? I’d argue yes, his header to set Uch up today was clever. Is he moping about? No. Is he hiding? Absolutely not.”

“The other thing to consider,” Austin said, “is what we have in reserve. What other options do we have?”

“Naismith, obviously,” I began, “Craig Wighton,”

“I love Craig to bits, he’s a clever player but he ain’t a goalscorer.” Austin stated.

“Fair point, then I suppose we’re looking at the reserves and Under-18s, aren’t we.” I said. “No-one’s bashing the door down, are they?”

“Young Darren Bain’s getting a few goals for the 18s, but he’s not physically ready. Even in the reserves he’s meat and drink for any half-decent centre-half.” Foxy said. “Wee Jay is more developed, scored plenty as well, but he’s not 17 for a month. He’d be a huge gamble but of the two, he’d be the one I’d try if that was the plan.”

I sat and drank, swivelling on my black chair. “Doesn’t help that we’re missing our two most creative players either,” I said. “I mean I know we’re still creating openings, but is the quality of chance as good as it is with Ricci and Jamie Walker in the side?”

“Well,” began Austin, “Sean Clare was outstanding in the Walker role at St Johnstone and then he was left out today.” I looked up and shot him a look. We’d argued long and hard about the wisdom or otherwise of leaving Sean out and going with the extra goal threat of Naismith and Washington, a decision that I’ll grant might have backfired. “There’s possibly some truth in what you say, though,” he conceded, “although it’s a hard thing to quantify.”

“Granted. I’m not using XG as a metric, that’s a load of old cobblers.” I said.

“The other thing we’re missing with Jamie out is that additional goal threat.” JD said. He chips in regularly.

“We don’t get enough goals from midfield, as a rule.” Austin interjected. “Sure, Jamie’s got a handful, Jake’s got 9 is it? Stevie half a dozen. But Ricci, Glenn, Peter, Sean – I think it’s one between them in, what, 70/80 combined appearances. You get goals from midfield, that takes the pressure off any misfiring striker.”

“Fair point,” I said. “But we don’t have that type of midfielder at the moment do we? Neither Glenn or Ricci are going to start getting beyond the centre forwards all of a sudden at this stage of the career, neither have the legs for it even if we asked them to. Peter’s a sheep in wolf’s clothing in midfield. Does a job, but he’s a centre half.”

“So, we get someone in who can do that.” Austin said.

“Sure, but we can’t right now can we?”

“Are we looking for someone of that ilk?”

“Of course, but they don’t grow on trees. Hopefully we’ll be able to get something done in the summer to rectify that issue. Right now we’re talking more immediately. What do we do between now and Kilmarnock? JD?”

“Take the pressure off the forwards. Have a chat with them, just quietly, tell them you’ve still got the utmost faith in them, ask them how they want to work through it. Leave Uche be, he’s fine at the moment, work with Con and Stevie a little, let them guide you, they’ll know what works for them a this stage of their careers.”

I took another swig from my bottle, draining the dregs before looking at my watch. “It’s just gone 7, sorry to keep you so long, gents. Thanks, as ever for your input. Food for thought. Head home and I’ll see you all Tuesday morning.”

Almost in unison they upped from their seats, we all shook hands and they left me to it. Once the door had closed behind me I dipped down into the fridge and picked up another beer, opening it on the bottle opener I had on the edge of my desk. I leaned back in my chair and closed my eyes. The blank week would be useful, allow us to get some much needed rest into the lads before things started up again with the trip to Rugby Park and then the replay at Easter Road. I’d just taken the first mouthful of ale when my phone rang. I picked it up and looked at the caller ID, it was Leah.

Sighing I put the bottle down, leaned back forward on my chair and slid to answer.

“Leah, what I can do for you?”

Team: Pereira, Smith, Souttar, Halkett, White (Watson), Haring, Whelan Naismth, Mulraney (Mehsino), Ikpeazu, Washington

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Saturday 15th February 2020: Kilmarnock v Heart of Midlothian (SPL)

Venue: Rugby Park

Att: 10,514

In the week running up to the tussle at Rugby Park against Kilmarnock, we really knuckled down on the training ground. Keeping the physical intensity relatively light, we had agreed as a coaching team to try and get the boys to work on instinct a little more rather than trying to force it and take the wrong option. JD had talked about how when he felt confident he played far more on instinct, the moment he started taking an extra touch, or taking the wrong option he knew he was overthinking things.

There was noticeable progress between the first session on Tuesday morning and the light five-a-side session on the Friday lunchtime, but doing it in training it one thing, putting it into practice when it mattered in front of 10,000 supporters was quite another.

Before the game, I tried to instil that belief into them, to get them to relax and not overthink things too much. At long last, and just for a change, it was hammering down with rain which was ‘just what the gardens needed’ a bit more of. The Rugby Park surface definitely needed a long stud but was otherwise in really good condition without any bald parts.

When I asked for instinctive play, well, I very nearly fell at the first hurdle. Some measured approach play by the hosts saw Gary Dicker play Liam Millar into the inside left channel with a delightful backheeled pass. Millar crossed to the back-post where Aidan White should have cleared easily. Instead, and inexplicably, he produced a superb downward header that was heading into his own net and would have opened the scoring but for a magnificent save by the thankfully alert Joel Pereira.

That saw twenty-five minutes or so of somewhat jittery football on our count, we looked nervy in possession but, thankfully, fairly comfortable out of it.

Just beyond the half-hour mark we finally put together some semblance of quality in an attacking sense, Uche Ikpeazu was released and saw his powerful effort excellently tipped over the top by Laurentiu Branescu in the home goal. Much better. Ryo Meshino then had an effort from just outside the penalty area go straight at Branescu before the deadlock was broken.

And in some style. Aidan White received the ball back from Conor Washington after a throw-in and then delivered a peach of a cross-field pass into the path of his fellow full-back on the opposite flank, Michael Smith. The right-back took a touch and just as he entered the penalty area drilled a superb low drive across Bransecu and into the bottom corner of the night. Thwack, what a strike! I was up off my seat punching the air, something I didn’t often do, but the relief was enormous. Not only a goal, but a goal of real quality. What a way for Smith to break his duck for the club.

We looked a different side after that, confidence flowing through the veins of the players and on the stroke of half-time, Stevie Naismith found Washington with a deft lofted pass. The striker showed confidence to take the effort first time, left-footed, however Branescu made another superb save, low to his left managing to touch it wide of the far post.

HALF TIME: Kilmarnock 0-1 Heart of Midlothian

“That’s alright, that is, boys,” I said at the break. “You’ve worked your way through that tough opening 30 and have bossed the last 15, well done. Well grafted. Get that second goal as early as you can and the points will be there for the taking. Just stay on your toes, stay aware at the back and we’ll be alright.”

I walked across the room to pick up a cup of tea. “Oh, one more thing,” I said in my best Colombo style. “Whitey, hard luck, fella , had that header gone in you’d have been nailed on for Goal of the Month!”

That provoked plenty of laughter and banter flying around the place, breaking the ice, which I was pleased about.

We began the second half as we began the first, Peter Haring played in Meshino but the winger wasn’t quite able to direct his shot either side of Branescu and the goalkeeper comfortably saved.

We did have to survive a bit of a scare a few minutes later when out of nowhere Dom Thomas unleashed a strike from fully 30 yards that looked to have caught Joel Pereira out. The keeper adjusted brilliantly though and threw out a right hand at full stretch to divert the ball away from the top corner.

We really needed that second goal to kill things off, Naismith missed a one-on-one opportunity but was called back anyway for offside as Killie pressed and pressed for an equaliser. I threw a couple of the younger boys into the action once again, Leo Watson and Anthony McDonald gaining more precious experience and in a situation that called for calm heads, both players did well.

Finally, with 7 minutes remaining, Smith found himself at the by-line down the right flank and drilled a low cross into the near post. Naismith got across has marker and flicked it goalwards, Nico Hamalainen had dived in to try and block either the cross or Naismith’s effort, he was a little unfortunate then that the ball rebounded off his torso and just inside the post. We didn’t care, we’d got that all important second goal and that was the points sealed.

Indeed, the wind had been taken out of Kilmarnock’s sails and we saw the remaining few minutes out in relative comfort, which was pleasing after a couple of iffy performances. We were nowhere near our best, but we were much better and with the big cup replay looming at Easter Road three days later, I was happy enough with that.

FULL TIME: Kilmarnock 0-2 Heart of Midlothian

Team: Pereira, Smith, Souttar, Halkett, White (Watson), Haring (McDonald), Whelan, Naismith, Meshino, Ikpeazu, Washington (Clare)

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Table as at Sunday 16th February 2020:

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Glasgow Rangers

26

21

3

2

67

15

66

52

Glasgow Celtic

26

20

5

1

58

17

65

41

Heart of Midlothian

27

16

6

5

56

33

54

23

Aberdeen

27

14

8

5

39

30

50

9

Kilmarnock

27

11

7

9

34

29

40

5

Motherwell

26

11

5

10

38

34

38

4

Hibernian

27

7

8

12

37

50

29

-13

St Mirren

27

8

4

15

26

43

28

-17

St Johnstone

27

7

6

14

30

44

27

-14

Livingston

26

5

6

15

24

56

21

-32

Hamilton Academical

27

2

8

17

19

49

14

-30

Ross County

27

3

4

20

21

49

13

-28

 

Friday 14th February 2020

Hamilton

1

2

St Johnstone

 

Saturday 15th February 2020

Celtic

5

0

Livingston

Hibs

3

1

Ross County

Kilmarnock

0

2

Hearts

St Mirren

0

1

Aberdeen

 

Sunday 16th February 2020

Motherwell

0

0

Rangers

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Tuesday afternoon in the press room at Tynecastle Park, meeting the massed Edinburgh sports media ahead of what was our most important match of the season so far, the Scottish Cup replay against Hibernian. I walked in with a cup of coffee steaming away in my china club branded mug, placed it on the table and Ellie Ogilvie, the press officer quickly reached into the picture and adjusted it so that the badge was showing towards the cameras.

“She has to do that every time,” I said. “Don’t you, Ellie?”

“Aye, it’s like training a cat to cook.” She replied as she ducked back into the shadows, eliciting laughter from the press pack.

“Okay, let’s get this show on the road, shall we? Who’s first.”

Kara Warwick: Hi Jones.

Hello Kara, are you well?

KW: I’m good thanks, you?

Yes, terrific thanks. What’s your question?

KW: You’ve now had plenty of time to reflect on the 2-2 draw here in the first match, what are you hoping to see your players do differently in the replay tomorrow?

Well, ideally we’ll score more than they do. That’d do me.

Laughter

In all seriousness, I’ve looked back at the first match with the coaching team, the boffins in the analysis hub have picked out some areas where we can improve. We know a little more about Hibs too, where their strengths and weaknesses lie so we’ll be looking to exploit them.

KW: Some people believe that cup replays are outdated and only serve to add more matches to an already overloaded schedule. What’s your take on them, should cup replays be scrapped?

I’m probably going to be thrown out of the Manager’s circle, but absolutely not. Replays have long been a part of cup competitions, many shocks and surprises have happened in replays. I suppose you could argue that perhaps scrapping them might encourage sides to go all out in the first game to win, but I think the negatives outweigh the positives, personally.

James Boyle: Have you had much trouble preparing for this additional fixture that wasn’t expected?

Not really, no. We had to adjust training schedules obviously, but we’ve had what, ten days to prepare? Having a blank midweek last week was a godsend because it meant we could do some proper work on the training field rather than mostly focus on rest and recovery as we’ve had to do recently with the multitude of matches we’ve been through.

JB: Of course, with a replay there’s the chance of extra-time and penalty kicks. Are you prepared for that?

We always practice penalties, it’s a weekly thing on a Friday afternoon. There was a little more edge to it than usual last week. I think preparation certainly helps ahead of times like this. As for extra time, if its required then yes, my boys are prepared. We’ve got them in a physical condition where stamina levels or good, so that doesn’t hold any fears for me.

Leah Young: You played well and got a good result on Saturday at Kilmarnock. Are you hoping the side carries on where they left off tomorrow?

Of course, yes. We haven’t been at our best for a couple of weeks now, but we were back on the right road on Saturday and that was really good to witness. We need to keep that hard work that we’ve shown throughout to build and put together a good run of results.

LY: Stevie Mallan clinched the replay for Hibs with that superb free-kick, do you think he’s the main threat for Hibs?

I’d just about erased that from my memory, I’ll have flashbacks again all night now!

Laughter

It was a brilliant free kick from a very good player. But as I’ve said before, Jack has a really good squad available to him, particularly in the attacking third and we’re going to have to stick to our game plan to ensure we don’t get undone.

LY: Who will you be looking at to counter the threat posed by Mallan?

Oh, I don’t think I’ll be giving anything away just yet, Leah. Nice try though. Has Jack got you on a little retainer?

More laughter in the room.

JB: How confident are you of securing a good result and sealing that home tie with Aberdeen in the last eight?

As I say, we’ve been good in training, the boys are in good spirits and we go into every game believing we can get a good result. More often than not we’ve been proven right so far this season and we hope that’ll be the case again tomorrow night.

Petar Genchev: What matters more: a win against Hibs, your local rivals, or a win against somebody else?

For me, I want to win no matter who we’re playing. It’s the same for the players. Of course, there’s a little more edge against your neighbours and rivals. I know the fans might see it a little differently, but that’s usually what rivalries are based upon, the supporters. They were here long before I was and will be long after I’m gone. We owe it to them to do all we can to win.

Ellie Ogilvie: Is that everything? Nothing else? Okay, thanks everyone.

Thanks all, hope you enjoy the game tomorrow.

I stood up and headed towards the door. “Jones!” It was Leah, she was coming towards me, I stopped and waited. “Sorry, do you have a couple of minutes?”

“Sure,” I replied. I was pretty well done for the day. “Do you want to walk and talk? I just need to pop up to the office and pick up my bits.”

She fell into step beside me. “Where’s the card then? It didn’t arrive Friday?”

I looked at her blankly.

“My card. That you sent,” she continued.

“Leah, what the f- are you on about? What card? I didn’t think it was your birthday until June?”

She rolled her eyes and smiled. “You really haven’t clue have you?”

“About what?!” I exclaimed, my exasperation beginning to rise.

“What’s the date today?”

I thought for a minute, frantically trying to do some maths. “18th

“Right,” she said. “So, what was the date on Friday?”

I counted backwards. “The 14th.”

“Excellent..” There was an expectant look in her eyes meeting yet another blank one in my own. “14th February,” she prompted.

“Yes, that’s right, 14th February.” We were approaching the office and I showed her in.

“Jeez, Jones. You’re the most hopeless man alive!” She exclaimed again. “Valentine’s Day!”

The cloud lifted, my eyebrows raised. “Ah – take a seat by the way, I won’t be long. – Valentine’s Day. Do you go in for all that tosh and flippery?” I asked as I closed down my laptop and unplugged it.

“Well, would be nice to know someone out there’s thinking of me, yeah.”

“Oh,” I stopped a moment and removed my glasses, pinching the bridge of my nose before sitting down and looking at her directly. “Sorry, I don’t really buy into it. Maybe I should have done though, it passed me by entirely if I’m honest.”

She laughed. “Don’t worry, I’m pulling your leg, you silly oaf.”

I looked at her, shook my head and blinked. Romantic, I wasn’t.

“The real reason I asked for a moment, this is totally off the record by the way, I’ve heard that there’s a rift between you and the board.”

Once again my eyebrows raised in surprised. “News to me.” I said evenly.

She searched my expression. “Really? Nothing in it?”

“Nope, nothing of the sort. I talk with Ann at least a couple of times a week, we’re very much working together to try and move the club on.” I said.

“Okay,” Leah said, I caught the slight hesitation.

“You don’t seem convinced.”

She thought for a moment, as if searching for the right words. “Well, I mean, it’s accepted that you’re doing a good club. I don’t know what targets you have or what you’ve been set by Ann and the board, but you’re third in the table and got the side playing entertaining football. The fans are united behind you, players talk about the bond they have and excellent atmosphere in the dressing room. So, on the face of it, everything’s rosy, right?”

“Mmm-hmm,” I nod in agreement. “So, I don’t see what your point, or more accurately your source’s point, is.”

“Well, you’ve got what, three months left on your contract, right?”

I nod.

“So, where’s the new one? I’ve heard there’s been no movement on offering you a new one. Has there?”

I remained unmoved.

“I mean, I’d have thought they’d have been keen to tie you down to something longer term. So, why haven’t they?”

“I don’t know what gets talked about upstairs,” I replied simply.

“Well, to someone from the outside looking in, it seems as though you and the board are at loggerheads.”

“Simply not the case,” I said. The lack of a contract offer was bothering me, Leah had largely expressed my own thoughts on things. In my head I’d thought that they might be waiting to see how I’d get on the Cup, the expectation was a place in the last 4 of the competition, although I’d be allowed some lee-way if I was to meet one of the Old Firm on the way, but even then, I felt personally that being 3rd and playing a brand of football that was entertaining the fans and winning some complements from neutral observers would have been enough at this stage to at least warrant a conversation.

“No?” Leah questioned.

“Absolutely not.” I replied emphatically. And as much as I was bothered by the lack of movement on a new contract, there had never been any hint of discord between myself and the board.

“Okay, I’ll take your word for it,” she said. “Don’t worry, there’s no story going live at the moment, but it’s being talked about in our circles, so don’t be surprised if you’re asked about it or speculation ends up in various places.”

“I appreciate the heads up,” I said, “genuinely, thanks. But there’s no story to be had.”

She shrugged her shoulders and picked up her bag. “Well, okay, thanks for seeing me, Jones.”

“Anytime, Leah, you know that.” I stood up to see her out. “See you tomorrow down the road?”

“I’ll be there.”

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Wednesday 19th February 2020: Hibernian v Heart of Midlothian (Scottish Cup 5th Round Replay)

Venue: Easter Road

Att: 20,421

“Crikey, that’s a big call!”

That phase, or variations of it were oft-uttered around the away end of Easter Road ahead of the big cup replay after I’d chosen to hand Leo Watson his first senior start at left-back ahead of Aidan White. Nothing quite like throwing a fledgling into the cauldron of a fierce local derby to test the player’s character in what was my only change to the side that had won at Kilmarnock.

The kid wouldn’t let me down, I knew that. He had a wise head on young shoulders and would take everything in his stride. I was pleased I’d turned down a couple of late offers to take him on-loan in January, with Aaron Hickey having headed to London in search of roads paved with gold, Leo had a real chance to develop and stake his claim.

Rain, by the way. Torrential rain.

The only thing better than the febrile atmosphere of a local derby is the intensity of a local derby under darkened skies and floodlights. Night football on a school evening is just better than any other kind of football anyway, particularly so when you were in the den of your nearest rivals.

The opening half an hour was utterly tedious on the pitch as the two sides cancelled each-other out until finally, just before the clock turned half-an-hour, we won a free-kick on the right-hand side. Ryo Meshino, who was enjoying a little run of starts swung it across to the far post where it was powerfully met by John Souttar. Ofir Marciano got across his goal to make a superb block not only from the centre-half’s header, but also the follow up from Stevie Naismith that was drilled at goal.

Brilliant goalkeeping.

Just as we were beginning to impose ourselves on the game things swiftly imploded.

Daryl Horgan received the ball on the left-flank for Hibs, Michael Smith had been caught the wrong side. As Horgan turned, he found himself barrelled over from behind from my right-back. He’d already been cautioned and his needlessly illegal intervention here brought with it the predictable red card and we were down to ten. Absolutely brainless, especially since the highlights showed that John Souttar was coming across to cover.

I immediately reacted by reshuffling, Conor Washington was unfortunately hooked with Anthony McDonald dropping into midfield alongside Glenn Whelan, which allowed Peter Haring to drop into a kind of auxiliary right-back / centre-back hybrid position alongside Souttar and Craig Halkett. I very much wanted to make sure Ryo and Naismith still had the freedom to get forward where possible and support Uche up front.

“Sorry, Conor,” I said to my number 9 as he wordlessly collected his tracksuit top and went to slump on the bench. I felt for him.

The temperature rose in the stands around me as the home support urged their resurgent heroes onwards, they could smell blood. We were defending quite well on the whole, though, and a heroic double block by Watson, firstly to deny Tiago Alves and then Halkett, to deny Florian Kamberi kept us level at the break.

HALF TIME: Hibernian 0-0 Heart of Midlothian

Smithy had wisely made himself scarce by the time we got into the dressing room at the break meaning that I could focus my words on what I wanted from the boys after the break rather than directing my fire at my departed right-back. From hero at the weekend to villain four days later.

I went around and made sure each player knew what their job was before giving them a little pep talk as a group just before they went back out.

For the first quarter of an hour we were note perfect defensively. Didn’t give anything away, worked hard to win the ball back and kept Joel Pereira well protected but then, in the 62nd minute a corner kick was headed clear to the edge of the box where it was picked up by a green shirt. Shifted to the right, Alves spotted the extra man, free for the first time in the half-an-hour or so they’d been a man up, loitering at the far post. He picked him out perfectly and Kamberi took a touch in acres of space before crashing the ball high, past Pereira into the roof of the net.

Over the next few minutes, as the game went on, I was deep in conversation with JD and Austin about how to try and change things, we’d been night on absent as an attacking force since Smith’s dismissal and we needed to at least give ourselves half a chance. After Horgan had gone clear down the left and forced a good stop from Pereira, I switched Anthony McDonald into an orthodox right-midfield role, moved Peter Haring back into midfield and went to a back three.

We gained a bit more control and looked more likely to at least create a little something, even if only a couple of half chances. With 9 minutes remaining, we got a free kick just inside the Hibs half. I sent everyone baring Whelan, the taker, and Pereira forward onto the edge of the Hibs box.

The delivery was inch perfect, between the back four, who backpedalled desperately, and too far out for Marciano to come and claim. Naismith was onto it and first time, tucked the ball beyond the Hibs keeper and into the back of the net for the equaliser.

“Flag’s up!” JD shouted.

I looked down the line, and sure enough, there was the assistant, stood to attention with his flag raised. Naismith was half a yard offside and the goal didn’t count.

The feeling of utter deflation was palpable. All around the howls of derision and laughter from the buoyant home fans grated. That urged me on, it urged me on to urge my players on.

7 minutes remaining and White cleared the ball from just inside his own half, although Naismith was beaten in the air, it fell kindly for Clare to break into the Hibs half. All of a sudden, we had three-on-two, the ball was shifted left for Meshino who missed the chance to feed Naismith in, instead going on the outside and working the angle against him a little. His shot was powerful, but Marciano was able to save comfortably.

The level of huff increased, the level of puff increased but try as we might, we found the Hibs house built of brick and not, as we’d hoped, straw or sticks. The players had run themselves into the ground and at the final whistle, to a man, collapsed to the floor. I congratulated Jack and wished him well for the next round before stepping out onto the sodden turf and helping the shattered players to their feet.

I couldn’t go in on them, they’d been let down by a team-mate. He’d be sure to get told what was what at training, as well as his fine. What a sorely disappointing evening.

FULL TIME: Hibernian 1-0 Heart of Midlothian

Team: Pereira, Smith, Souttar, Halkett, Watson (White), Haring, Whelan, Naismith, Meshino, Ikpeazu (Clare), Washington (McDonald)

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Sunday 23rd February 2020: Glasgow Celtic v Heart of Midlothian

Venue: Parkhead

Att: 60,411

It was my final day of being 20 years old and I was in a joyous mood. It was matchday and we were off to Glasgow to give the title challengers on the green side of the city a damned bloody nose. Not only that, there was no rain. None at all. Not a drop to be seen or felt. Indeed, the sky had chosen to turn itself blue for the occasion. Today was going to be the day that, at the sixth time of asking, we beat one of the Old Firm. We’d been getting closer and closer to it and after St Mirren had held the Bhoys to a goalless draw a couple of weeks before, there was nothing to fear.

We had suffered a little blow with Joel Pereira ruled out after being consigned to bed with the flu, so Zdenek ‘Zlammo’ Zlamel came in to deputise and Kevin Silva was on the bench. Michael Smith kept his place despite his dismissal in midweek whilst Aidan White returned in place of Leo Watson. Further forward there were recalls for Sean Clare and Jake Mulraney, with Ryo Meshino and Conor Washington dropping to the bench.

The hosts were 4 points off Rangers at the top and both sides had been dropping points where you’d have expected them not to. Although coming off a 5-0 win over Livingston the week before, those dropped points against St Mirren had damaged Celtic’s hopes. That said, with the Gers drawing 0-0 at Motherwell seven days previously, to some extent the Bhoys had been left slightly off the hook. The day before they’d struggled to a 1-0 win over Hibs to extend the gap to 4. It was a must win for our hosts.

The plan then was to frustrate as long as we could defensively, keep the ball when we had it and take any chances that came our way. The longer that went on, the more anxious the home fans would get and the hope was that’d then transmit itself into their players.

The plan worked.

For 8½ minutes.

That’s all the time it took for Oliver Ntcham to send the ball in between Smith and John Souttar for Leigh Griffiths to run onto before slipping it between Zlamel and the near post. Doubly difficult for the on-watching Hearts faithful that, not only seeing their side undone with consummate ease, but a former Hibs man applying the finishing touch.

Poor defending, poor goalkeeping.

Somehow, we managed to trump it six minutes later. We’d actually enjoyed some decent possession, albeit without any cutting edge before a move broke down. Scott Brown played it to Ntcham and again he picked out the run of Griffiths through the middle with a simple long pass from back to front. The Scotland international took the ball down on the run, just goal-side of Halkett, before striking the ball right-footed from 25 yards out low. Zlamel seemed to be taken a little by surprise, got down late as the ball fizzed past him into the bottom corner of the net.

Watching the goal back, Griffiths was the only Celtic player in our half whilst we had six, not including Zlammo in our own half. An absolute scandal.

Just over two minutes later, Ntcham received the ball again, just inside his own half and spotted Griffiths making a run through a cavernous gap between our centre-halves, there must have been 20 yards for him to move into. The pass was simple, the run wasn’t tracked and again, although the shot was well struck, it seemed to go through Zlammo’s arms as he reacted slowly.

It had taken 7 minutes and 31 seconds for Leigh Griffiths to complete his hat-trick, we were in absolute disarray and I was too dumbstruck on the touchline for a few minutes to even rage at what I’d witnessed.

There was a mild improvement in so far as we managed to at least stem the flow of goals, although this was sometimes through nothing more than luck. A free kick was only partially cleared and Jozo Simunovic’s left footed volley took a deflection off Smith and crashed away off the post before, on 39 minutes, a free-kick on the right by the by-line was drifted in to the far post where it was met by an unmarked Scott Sinclair who planted his header into the net from a very tight angle.

With only seconds remaining, Hatem Abd Elhamed linked up nicely with James Forrest and found himself with a clear path to goal. His shot beat Zlammo but rebounded off the near post and mercifully back out of play for a goal-kick.

HALF TIME: Glasgow Celtic 4-0 Heart of Midlothian

Outplayed, outfought, out-thought. It had been a chastening 45-minutes, one that I’d not yet experienced in my managerial career. As the players filed in I returned to my chair in the dugout to collect my thoughts and compose myself for a couple of minutes. My heart was racing, by blood boiling with the dismal performance and, most disappointingly, attitude of my players. If I went into the dressing room straight away, things would be ripped from the wall and thrown, benches upended. Two minutes, that was all I needed.

When I opened the door, I was pleased to find everyone in stunned silence, eyes at the floor. No-one met my gaze as I paced around the room, leaving the door open.

Maybe a minute or so before I spoke.

“I don’t really know what to say, boys. So f- off while I have a cup of tea.”

No-one moved.

“Go on,” I said, pointing at the door. “F- off. I want to enjoy my cuppa without having to look at you f-ers.”

Slowly, led by Glenn Whelan, one by one they got up off their benches and sheepishly filed out whilst I wandered over to the urn to make myself a drink.

8 minutes after the restart, Ntcham once again found Griffiths in acres of space inside the penalty area. The hat-trick hero struck his effort powerfully towards the near-post, this time Zlammo did well to get down and block, turning the ball behind.

After that we finally got to grips with the occasion and our opponents – granted, their foot had long since left the throttle, but there was finally a little bit of intensity from my boys.

So much so that we absolutely bossed the final ten minutes. Uche got onto a long John Souttar free kick from deep inside his own half but drifted his shot wide of the far post, whilst with 2 minutes remaining, a delightful cross from Leo Watson saw Uche do well to beat two defenders and nod inches wide of the post.

There wasn’t to be as a consolation for us and quite honestly, had we scored one, it would have been flattering in the extreme.

I’d hoped the following day would have been spent quietly off by myself exploring Scotland a bit, finding a secluded bit of coastline and just watching the sea for a couple of hours thinking. Instead, I was going to be mulling on this horror-show.

“Thanks for that lads, going to be a real treat seeing you lot tomorrow.” I said bitterly in the dressing room. “9 o’clock, two weeks off any of you that’s so much as a second late. I hope each and every one of you sleeps as badly as I’m going to.”

And that was that. I went to face the press, to admit my side’s shortcomings, wish Celtic well for the run-in and apologise to the supporters.

What a day. Not one for the memory bank at all.

FULL TIME: Glasgow Celtic 4-0 Heart of Midlothian

Team: Zlamel, Smith, Souttar, Halkett (Berra), White (Watson), Haring, Whelan, Clare, Mulraney (Meshino), Ikpeazu, Naismith

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Table as at Sunday 23rd February 2020:

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Glasgow Rangers

27

22

3

2

68

15

69

53

Glasgow Celtic

27

21

5

1

62

17

68

45

Heart of Midlothian

28

16

6

6

56

37

54

19

Aberdeen

28

15

8

5

43

32

53

11

Kilmarnock

28

11

7

10

34

32

40

2

Motherwell

27

11

6

10

39

35

39

4

Hibernian

28

7

8

13

37

51

29

-14

St Mirren

28

8

5

15

27

44

29

-17

St Johnstone

28

7

7

14

31

45

28

-14

Livingston

27

5

7

15

25

57

22

-32

Hamilton Academical

28

3

8

17

22

49

17

-27

Ross County

28

3

4

21

23

53

13

-30

 

Saturday 22nd February

Hibernian

0

1

Rangers

Kilmarnock

0

3

Hamilton

Motherwell

1

1

St Johnstone

Ross County

2

4

Aberdeen

St Mirren

1

1

Livingston

 

Sunday 23rd February

Celtic

4

0

Hearts

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Table as at Tuesday 25th February 2020:

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Glasgow Rangers

28

23

3

2

70

16

72

54

Glasgow Celtic

27

21

5

1

62

17

68

45

Heart of Midlothian

28

16

6

6

56

37

54

19

Aberdeen

28

15

8

5

43

32

53

11

Kilmarnock

28

11

7

10

34

32

40

2

Motherwell

28

11

6

11

40

37

39

3

Hibernian

28

7

8

13

37

51

29

-14

St Mirren

28

8

5

15

27

44

29

-17

St Johnstone

28

7

7

14

31

45

28

-14

Livingston

27

5

7

15

25

57

22

-32

Hamilton Academical

28

3

8

17

22

49

17

-27

Ross County

28

3

4

21

23

53

13

-30

 

Tuesday 25th February

Rangers

2

1

Motherwell

 

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Wednesday 4th March 2020: Heart of Midlothian v Motherwell (SPL)

Venue: Tynecastle

Att: 19,359

I’ll readily admit now, many years later, that I sulked a good while after that humbling at Parkhead. I was still young, relatively immature. For a week afterwards, I didn’t say so much as good morning to any of the players. Since we had a blank midweek and weekend after our Hibs defeat in the cup, I had them in every single day and worked them hard. I watched and prowled, prowled and watched. I made notes, I wanted them to feel as though they were on trial. The worst thing after getting hammered like that is then having a long wait to get it all out of your system, to see what the actual damage had been.

It was the first time we’d lost two matches in a row since the beginning of the league campaign and the first time we’d gone two matches without scoring since the 0-0 draw at Arbroath and 3-0 defeat at home to Rangers that kicked our league campaign off. Conor Washington was without a goal now in his last seven matches, Uche had gone three without scoring and Stevie Naismith without a goal in five.

There was some good news to be found, though, and it came in the shape of Ricci Montolivo and Jamie Walker returning to full fitness. Such was my mood that they both returned straight to the starting line-up for the visit of Motherwell to Tynecastle. We had to turn our form around, since we’d beaten Livingston 3-0 on 22nd January, we’d won just 2 of our last 8 matches in all competitions. If ever I needed a little reminder as to why I was still waiting for any sign of a new contract, this was very much probably it.

The night before had seen Hamilton sensationally record a second consecutive win, this one at Pittodrie which meant that against the odds, we went into the match still in 3rd, a point above the Dons and with a game in hand. A chance to extend our gap to four points.

Monti and Jamie came in for Sean Clare and Peter Haring, Ryo Meshino once again swapped with Jake Mulraney whilst Conor Washington came back in to look to end his drought whilst Stevie Naismith took a little breather on the substitute’s bench. Chopping and changing, trying to find that formula, once again.

The opening quarter of an hour gave little hint as to what was to come. With neither side in the best of form, there were misplaced passes aplenty, the game littered with poor touches and raised arms in apology.

Then, we received a free kick about 3 or 4 yards outside the right corner of the penalty area. Ryo Meshino swung it in towards the far post where Christophe Berra met it with a firm header, back across goal. Mark Gillespie got down to it but found too much power on the header, and the skipper wheeled away in delight as the ball crept inside the post and into the net to give us the lead.

Three minutes later Berra was then at fault as he misjudged a long goal-kick downfield from Gillespie, getting completely underneath the high ball. Devante Cole had done well to gamble, took a touch and then from just outside the D, struck a superb low shot that beat Pereira all ends up on its way into the bottom corner of the net to bring the scores level.

Thereafter followed another little scrappy spell that ended on 29 minutes when Michael Smith broke up a promising Motherwell attack. He found Souttar whose ball forward was nodded back by Uche for Jamie Walker. The attacking midfielder, immediately showing the guile that we’d been sorely lacking, then sent a ball down the side of the Motherwell defence for Uche to run onto, as he got into the penalty area, he feinted to shoot at the near post, but instead whipped his foot around the ball to send it across Gillespie and into the far corner of the net to restore our advantage.

That was the killer blow.

Less than 90 seconds later, Montolivo sent a tempting ball in just behind the Motherwell defence. The two centre halves were slow to react and quite honestly, Gillespie should have come out to gather. Either way, what shouldn’t have happened did, as Uche stole in and simply slipped the loose ball inside Gillespie’s near post and into the net to all of a sudden make the score 3-1 to us.

Any notion of that providing us with a comfort blanket was immediately dispelled within a minute of the restart, James Scott got clear but found his shot superbly blocked by a swiftly covering Smith. The ball fell to Liam Polworth 30-yards from goal and he sent a peach of a first time strike left footed beyond the slightly out of position Joel Pereira and into the bottom corner of the net.

The game was back on.

With 7 minutes of the 1st half remaining, Montolivo sent a corner kick into the heart of the six-yard box, Berra and a defender went to meet it at the near post, both missed and as it fell, Uche had stolen in unnoticed to plunder his 3rd goal of the evening and 20th of the season with the simplest of volleyed finishes from close range.

This time there was no immediate comeback, instead within a minute Washington had very nearly intercepted a casual backpass but Gillespie, to his credit, did brilliantly to play the ball off of the onrushing striker and dive to smother the rebound.

HALF TIME: Heart of Midlothian 4-2 Motherwell

I was a lot happier with that, I could forego the defensive lapses a little because we’d looked so good going forward, not only that, we were back entertaining the supporters. I simply urged them for more of the same and to come back in 45-minutes later with a well deserved 3 points, nothing more, nothing less.

Within four minutes of the restart, a beautiful through ball sent Washington clear, Gillespie came out to narrow the angle but the striker showed real quality to use his left foot to guide it around the goalkeeper and into the back of the net to complete our nap hand, ending his drought in the process. Except.

There was the Assistant, flag raised, brining the Ulsterman’s relief to a shuddering halt.

I was up and encouraging Conor to go again, he’d suffered some rotten luck in recent matches, he really had to keep believing.

On 52 minutes, the visitors very nearly scored another superb strike from distance as David Turnbull unleashed a superb half-volley 30 yards from an Alan Hutton ball inside that beat Pereira but unfortunately for the midfielder, shaved the top of the crossbar on its way over the bar.

7 minutes later, a flowing move from back to front and right to left saw the ball crossed in by Meshino, the header clear fell nicely for Walker who picked up possession, burst into the area and squared it. It should have been cut out by a defender, but wasn’t, and once again Uche was in the right place at the right time to simply pass the ball into the net and complete his 4-timer, taking him two goals clear of Conor Washington at the top of the goalscoring charts.

That was that for Uche, he was immediately replaced by Stevie, giving the fans the chance to give him the ovation his performance deserved. I also withdrew Ricci and brought on Peter Haring to make sure the Italian was well protected for the weekend derby against Hibs.

It was nice to see universal acclaim for Uche when he was taken off from around the ground, I knew when I took the job that he was a bit of a target for the boo-boys, his uncompromising and at times ill-at-ease style not necessarily being the most attractive for supporters. He’d been brilliant for me and I couldn’t have been happier for him as he took his top, wearing an enormous smile across his face.

Cole fashioned himself a half-chance before on 62 minutes, Naismith knocked the ball back for Smith. He sent a lovely cross in from deep on the right flank that picked out the run of Meshino who didn’t need to break stride as he stooped and sent a superb header beyond Gillespie’s dive and into the net for his fifth goal of the campaign.

Since losing to Motherwell in the League Cup back in August, we’d gone on to score 4, then 5 and now 6 against them in the league – the chant of ‘Can We Play You Every Week?’ was ringing around the rafters and all the stress of the little dip in form was ebbing away.

There was still half an hour remaining although with Hibs ahead at the weekend, I didn’t mind the intensity dropping a little. Pereira made a good low save from Michal Skvarka’s low shot – again from distance – and even when, with 7 minutes remaining David Turnbull’s 25-yarder screamed into the top corner beyond Pereira to reduce the arrears to three, I was fairly sanguine. To Motherwell’s credit, all three of their strikes had been magnificent and they’d played their full part in a magnificent 9 goal thriller.

There could have been a tenth in stoppage time when Washington fired inches past the angle from just inside the penalty area, shortly after which the referee brought proceedings to a halt.

Three points, six goals and, I felt, finally back in business.

Now, onto the home straight and the final quarter of the campaign, make that 3rd place ours.

FULL TIME: Heart of Midlothian 6-3 Motherwell

Team: Pereira, Smith, Souttar, Berra, White (Watson), Montolivo (Haring), Whelan, Walker, Meshino, Ikpeazu (Naismith), Washington

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Table as at Wednesday 4th March 2020:

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Glasgow Rangers

29

23

3

3

71

18

72

53

Glasgow Celtic

28

22

5

1

64

18

71

46

Heart of Midlothian

29

17

6

6

62

40

57

22

Aberdeen

29

15

8

6

45

35

53

10

Kilmarnock

29

11

8

10

35

33

41

2

Motherwell

29

11

6

12

43

43

39

0

Hibernian

29

8

8

13

42

53

32

-11

St Mirren

29

9

5

15

30

45

32

-15

St Johnstone

29

7

8

14

32

46

29

-14

Livingston

28

5

7

16

27

62

22

-35

Hamilton Academical

29

4

8

17

25

51

20

-26

Ross County

29

3

4

22

24

56

13

-32

 

Tuesday 3rd March

Aberdeen

2

3

Hamilton

Livingtson

2

5

Hibernian

Ross County

1

3

St Mirren

St Johnstone

1

1

Kilmarnock

 

Wednesday 4th March

Hearts

6

3

Motherwell

Rangers

1

2

Celtic

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Sunday 8th March 2020: Heart of Midlothian v Hibernian (SPL)

Venue: Tynecastle

Att: 20,099

That win had really lifted the place, it’s only after the fact that you realise just how much of a hit morale has taken during a sticky run, coming into the training complex after scoring half a dozen goals and thoroughly blowing away the cobwebs, absolutely everyone was in great spirits. Faces were lighter, as were moods across the board, there was laughter aplenty, banter flying about the place yet, when we were going through a drill or lecture session, the concentration was there.

That made me feel fairly confident with the approaching visit once again of Hibernian at the weekend, that we were fine. Before the two matches in the cup, I realised there’d been a note of tension around the place, that had notably lifted.

“On wrongs, swift vengeance waits.” I said, opening the Saturday lunchtime tactical briefing in the auditorium at the training ground. “Anyone know who said that?” I asked.

I was met, as I expected, by blank faces all round.

“Alexander Pope. Anyone know who Alexander Pope was?” I asked.

Again, nothing but blank faces met the question.

“He was an 18th Century English poet, often quoted, like I’ve just done. He was also an ardent Hearts fan.”

Now a hand shot up. It was Glenn Whelan. “Is that really so, boss?” There was a large hint of scepticism in his voice.

“No, of course not,” I replied, “but he might have been had he been born 200 years later and in Edinburgh. That’s not the point, the point is that you’ll rarely hear me talk of vengeance and gaining revenge, but we owe Hibs one after the limp way we went out of the Scottish Cup a couple of weeks ago.”

I handed over to Austin to go through the particulars tactically and I had chosen to go with an unchanged side. They didn’t know it at this point, I’d name the team as always an hour and a half before kick-off, but it was to be the same 18 that went in against Motherwell four days previously.

Once again, we were greeted on matchday by a deluge of rain, something we were all now very used to. The opening quarter of an hour wasn’t great, typical harum-scarum derby fayre before Aidan White intercepted a Stevie Mallan pass. He passed it forward to Jamie Walker who touched it back for Glenn Whelan to swing a lovely lofted pass in behind the Hibs right-back, David Gray, for Ryo Meshino to latch onto. The Japanese winger took the ball beautifully on his chest on the run, took a couple of touches into the penalty area and even though it was clear for all to see that he was going to slip the ball into the far corner right footed, Ofir Marciano was helpless to stop him doing so and we had the early lead.

That put us in the ascendency and we began to knock the ball around with confidence. In the 20th minutes, White again broke up a Hibs attack and played the ball forward to Meshino. Ryo, who was really flourishing after a difficult first six-months at the club, went on a run in-field and fed the ball into Uche. The big man held the ball up nicely and played it out to the right-wing where Michael Smith was galloping forward on the overlap, he stopped, knocked it inside for Walker and then ran beyond his marker to collect the return and find himself in the perfect place to cross. Two touches took him to the byline and he stood the ball up, out of the reach of Marciano and right onto the grateful head of Conor Washington who headed powerfully home from about 3-yards out.

His relief and delight was plain to see, just like a batsman who’s been stuck on 99 for forty minutes, his 20th goal of the season was greeted as gloriously as his first senior strike would have been. All of us on the bench couldn’t have been happier for the Ulsterman.

2-0 up and cruising.

We looked in full control, restricting our opponents to hopeful balls into the box that were easy fodder for the two centre-halves, or shooting from distance high, wide and handsome, or straight at Pereira. It was a surprise, therefore, when on 31 minutes Gray drifted a ball into the box, picking up Daryl Horgan who had stolen in on the blindside of Smith. As the ball dropped, the winger coolly guided it first-time inside the near post just past Pereira who couldn’t stop it at full-stretch.

Suddenly, it was game on and now it was Hibs that looked the better and more compact side, for a few minutes at least.

Then, on 35 minutes, Smith broke up an attack and Souttar brought the ball forward before shuffling it left for Montolivo, the Italian went back to Christophe Berra who sent a lovely ball wide for Meshino, down the left flank. His first touch went one side of Gray whilst he wriggled around the other and set off for the penalty area. Left footed he then drove a low cut-back towards the edge of the area, behind Washington but perfectly for Uche to meet first time, and he thundered a first-time strike beyond Marciano into the top corner of the net to restore our two-goal advantage. It was another superbly worked goal.

The pendulum of control swung back in our favour and we looked a very good side once again for the final ten minutes of the half. When the whistle went, Tynecastle was absolutely bouncing in a way I’d never felt it before.

HALF TIME: Heart of Midlothian 3-1 Hibernian

“You hear that?” I asked, pointing outside, “I’ve never heard that level of enthusiasm here before. We’ll forget that four or five minute spell after their goal, aside from that you’ve been outstanding boys. Three terrifically worked goals, some fabulous football, go on now and put on a similar show in the second half for them.”

I don’t think I’d ever felt better at half-time, such a complete contrast to a fortnight previously at Parkhead where we’d found ourselves 4-0 down and looking like a ragged bunch of snotty arsed schoolboys. A week is a long time in politics, a fortnight is a whole different era in football.

The second period began with us once again looking very confident. We did have to ride out a scare in the 58th minute when a free-kick was met by Tiago Alves, but his header went inches over the crossbar, and Joe Newell snatched at a presentable chance, dragging his shot wide of the post, but that aside, I was more than content with the way we were playing.

Our reward came in the 61st minute and from a most unusual source.

A free kick was awarded a yard or so outside the penalty area, to the left of the D. Glenn Whelan took responsibility smashing the ball beyond the 2-man wall and beyond Marciano into the back of the net, off the underside of the crossbar for his first goal for the club. And scored in some style.

Not only was it his first for the club, it was the first by any central midfielder of the season, in our 38th match. Long overdue.

That absolutely killed the game as a contest and as time went on, we began to toy with our opponents a little, like a cat would do with a wounded mouse. With two minutes remaining, some keep-ball triangles on the right-flank ended with Daryl Horgan’s frustration getting the better of him. Whelan knocked the ball past him and the winger went in with his elbow on the Irishman, catching him on the cheek bone right in front of the Assistant on that side. The flag immediately went up, Whelan walked away and within seconds, Bobby Madden had shown Horgan a straight red card, leaving Hibs to play the final few minutes with ten men.

It was a bitter end to an otherwise superb afternoon and one which, more than any other game since the winter break, had made me feel very happy with the outcome.

Eight games remaining and it was beginning to feel as though we’d be able to enjoy the run-in.

FULL TIME: Heart of Midlothian 4-1 Hibernian

Team: Pereira, Smith, Souttar, Berra (Halkett), White, Montolivo, Whelan, Walker (Naismith), Meshino (Mulraney), Ikpeazu, Washington

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Table as at Sunday 8th March 2020:

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Glasgow Rangers

30

24

3

3

73

18

75

55

Glasgow Celtic

29

23

5

1

68

20

74

48

Heart of Midlothian

30

18

6

6

66

41

60

25

Aberdeen

30

16

8

6

46

35

56

11

Kilmarnock

30

11

8

11

35

34

41

1

Motherwell

30

11

7

12

45

45

40

0

Hibernian

30

8

8

14

43

57

32

-14

St Mirren

30

9

5

16

30

47

32

-17

St Johnstone

30

7

8

15

34

50

29

-16

Livingston

29

5

7

17

29

65

22

-36

Hamilton Academical

30

4

9

17

27

53

21

-26

Ross County

30

4

4

22

27

58

16

-31

 

Friday 6th March

Aberdeen

1

0

Kilmarnock

 

Saturday 7th March

Hamilton

2

2

Motherwell

Livingston

2

3

Ross County

Rangers

2

0

St Mirren

St Johnstone

2

4

Celtic

 

Sunday 8th March

Hearts

4

1

Hibernian

 

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Table as at Tuesday 10th March 2020:

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Glasgow Celtic

30

24

5

1

70

20

77

50

Glasgow Rangers

30

24

3

3

73

18

75

55

Heart of Midlothian

30

18

6

6

66

41

60

25

Aberdeen

30

16

8

6

46

35

56

11

Kilmarnock

30

11

8

11

35

34

41

1

Motherwell

30

11

7

12

45

45

40

0

Hibernian

30

8

8

14

43

57

32

-14

St Mirren

30

9

5

16

30

47

32

-17

St Johnstone

30

7

8

15

34

50

29

-16

Livingston

30

5

7

18

29

67

22

-38

Hamilton Academical

30

4

9

17

27

53

21

-26

Ross County

30

4

4

22

27

58

16

-31

 

Tuesday 10th March

Livingston

0

2

Celtic

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Saturday 14th March 2020: St Mirren v Heart of Midlothian (SPL)

Venue: Simple Digital Arena

Att: 8,023

We visited Paisley full of confidence, as you’d expect of a side that had netted ten times in their previous couple of matches. I allowed myself the rare luxury of picking an unchanged side for the third consecutive time and really needed to say very little before we got started except for “more of the same, lads.” It really was that simple.

The Saints came into the game still needing points to be sure of securing their SPL spot for the following season but, with a twelve-point gap over Hamilton, who were in the relegation play-off spot with 8 matches remaining. It should just be a rubber-stamping exercise, but football is an unpredictable game.

As was shown in the opening 45-minutes which, after two matches of scintillating, open and entertaining football was absolutely devoid of any kind of quality or fun. Credit to the Saints, who defended brilliantly from the front, but at the break I was sorely disappointed.

HALF TIME: St Mirren 0-0 Heart of Midlothian

“Okay, boys, I don’t need to tell you how dismal that first 45 was. I don’t know what’s happened, but I need you to be braver after the break, take one or two risks, that’s fine, it just needs to be better. Okay? If we come away without a result but you’ve had a good go – a better go than that, no problem.”

There was no ranting, no raving, just a quiet chat. I didn’t want us to go into ‘end of season’ mode, there was still a long way to go, a lot of football to be played.

7 minutes after the restart, a corner kick from Ross Wallace wasn’t defended and it dropped for Tony Andreu to fire a half-volley at goal. It was a fierce strike but Joel Perreira plunged to his left to repel it well with two strong hands.

The ball fell kindly for Washington who then led a counter-raid, we had a three-on-two situation but, as was symptomatic of our play up until that point, Uche strayed offside and the chance went begging.

In the end, our first really good opening came from a long-ball forward by Souttar, it wasn’t a bad strategy since trying to play through the Saints had seen us come up short time and again. The ball found Uche, who held off a defender before firing an effort at goal, Vaclav Hladky though made a terrific save, pushing the ball over the top of the bar for a corner kick.

Things were improving, slowly but surely, on 64 minutes a corner from Wallace was headed clear at the near post and fell for Jamie Walker, who had the freedom to sprint forward over the halfway line. He kept going, deep into Saints territory, going past the challenge of Oskar Buur and getting into the penalty area. Just as he drew his foot back to pull the trigger, Buur bundled him over getting nothing of the ball and the penalty was awarded. The referee adjudged that even though a goalscoring opportunity had been denied, Buur’s attempt to win the ball was genuine and so he was saved from a red card.

Walker picked himself up to take the spot kick went for power over direction and fired it almost straight at Hladky. The goalkeeper had stood up and diving to his left, made a superb block with both hands, pushing the ball well away from goal before getting up and collecting the loose ball.

Two minutes later, a free kick into the box from Whelan was superbly met by Ikpeazu, who rose higher than anyone else. Hladky was well beaten, but the ball bounced down off the underside of the crossbar and didn’t cross the line as we’d like. Coll Donaldson did really well to react first and hook the ball away from the dangerzone.

It was better, but it wasn’t enough. Those efforts were flashes in the pan rather than part of a concerted siege and bombardment. We’d been the better side, but I couldn’t begrudge Jim Goodwin the point his side’s hard work had won him. For the Saints, that was a point closer to securing safety and for us it was a point further away from Aberdeen in 3rd place after their win the previous evening.

Meanwhile, above us, the title race was about to take a real turn…

FULL TIME: St Mirren 0-0 Heart of Midlothian

Team: Pereira, Smith, Souttar, Berra, White, Montolivo, Whelan, Walker (Mulraney), Meshino (Naismith), Ikpeazu, Washington

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Table as at Sunday 15th March 2020:

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Glasgow Celtic

31

25

5

1

72

20

80

52

Glasgow Rangers

31

24

3

4

73

19

75

54

Heart of Midlothian

31

18

7

6

66

41

61

25

Aberdeen

31

17

8

6

48

35

59

13

Kilmarnock

31

12

8

11

37

34

44

3

Motherwell

31

11

7

13

45

47

40

-2

Hibernian

31

8

9

14

44

58

33

-14

St Mirren

31

9

6

16

30

47

33

-17

St Johnstone

31

7

9

15

35

51

30

-16

Livingston

31

5

7

19

29

69

22

-40

Hamilton Academical

31

4

9

18

27

55

21

-28

Ross County

31

5

4

22

28

58

19

-30

 

Friday 13th March

Livingston

0

2

Aberdeen

 

Saturday 14th March

Celtic

2

0

Hamilton

Hibernian

1

1

St Johnstone

Motherwell

0

2

Kilmarnock

St Mirren

0

0

Hearts

 

Sunday 15th March

Ross County

1

0

Rangers

 

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Saturday 21st March 2020: Heart of Midlothian v Ross County (SPL)

Venue: Tynecastle

Att: 18,573

Our penultimate fixture of the regular season before a Spring break and the division dividing itself in half between the more excitingly named Championship Group and Relegation Group than they actually were, saw Ross County come into town.

Although bottom of the table, the former Highland Leaguers were in high spirits after giving their survival hopes an enormous boost the weekend before, beating Rangers 1-0, at the same time severely denting the Ibrox side’s title hopes. That win had brought them within 3 points of Livingston in 10th place, and 2 within Hamilton who still sat in the relegation play-off zone.

I was forced into one change and made a couple of others. Jamie Brandon again deputised for the suspended Michael Smith at right-back whilst I once again gave Leo Watson some minutes at left-back in place of Aidan White. Further forward, Stevie Naismith came in for Ryo Meshino, who was given a rest whilst Anthony McDonald came into the bench in place of Jake Mulraney.

The visitors began brightly, forcing a couple of corners that were well defended before Stevie Naismith collected a pass just inside the Ross County and accelerated away, too quick for one challenge before firing an effort from 25-yards that beat the goalkeeper, but was always rising.

In the 14th minute, a lovely pass from Montolivo picked out Leo Watson down the left, the youngster took a touch before sending a lovely cross into the box. Washington got up well to head it down for Naismith, but once again the experienced forward’s effort was too high and Marian Kelemen was untroubled.

A minute later and a dangerous cross into our box from Josh Mullin was hoisted clear long by John Souttar and then won by Uche, heading the ball on for Washington to run onto. The striker did well to outpace his marker, but Kelemen stood up well and made a good block to keep the game goalless. We then had strong appeals for a penalty waved away when Washington appeared to be impeded inside the area trying to reach a Brandon cross, nothing doing though.

It was the 18th minute when the goal came, a headed clearance found Glenn Whelan on the edge of the box and he laid it wide for Montolivo. The cross towards the far post was inch-perfect and Uche, as he did so often, ran off the shoulder of his marker to leather the ball home first time from just inside the 6-yard box for his 23rd goal of the season.

Four minutes later, and it was very nearly 2-0. Montolivo collected a pass from Whelan and sent a gorgeous ball out to the left wing where Jamie Walker received it, chesting it down one side of his marker and bursting around him on the other side before setting off for the penalty area. He could have squared the ball for Washington, but keen to make up for his penalty miss at St Mirren, looked to pass it across Kelemen into the bottom corner of the net. The goalkeeper stood up well though, and diving to his left, made a fine save to push the ball around the post.

Another three minutes on and we were served notice that Ross weren’t just here to make up the numbers. Leo Watson lost possession down the left flank and the ball was neatly worked forward for Billy McKay inside the penalty area. The angle was tight, and the striker did well to get his shot off and on target, unfortunately for him, Pereira was equal to it and made a fine save pushing the ball over the bar.

Punishment was served a couple of minutes later. Souttar, Montolivo and Whelan exchanged passes before the former went back to Pereira. The goalkeeper picked Montolivo out again and he shuffled the ball forward for Naismith, who had dropped into a pocket of space. Turning, he sent a lovely ball left for Walker to chase onto. He teased his marker before curling a cross with his right foot across the face of the six-yard box beyond Washington, right onto the head of Ikpeazu who did really well to guide his header just inside the post and beyond the reach of Kelemen to make it 2-0.

We were now playing some lovely stuff, a spell of one-touch football saw Brandon chip the ball forward where Washington won the aerial duel with his marker and cushioned a header into the pass of Uche. The in-form striker really should have made it a second hat-trick inside four matches but took one touch too many and when he shot found the angle too acute. Kelemen still needed to make a good save, which he did, but it was definitely a chance missed not only for Uche to add to his match-ball collection but put the game beyond reach of the visitors.

The first half was another thrilling advert for the SPL and Ross were playing their part. In the 33rd minute a Ewan Henderson chipped pass from deep in behind Jamie Brandon was met on the full by Scott Wright, just on the edge of the penalty area. The effort was true, beat Pereira but dipped a fraction too late and rippled the roof of the net on its way behind for a goal kick.

Three minutes later, a free kick from the left was headed back across goal by Joe Chalmers where it was met by Callum Morris. Pereira made a good save low down to his right, but the Assistant’s flag was up for offside against Chalmers at the far post. A let-off for us, we’d fallen asleep.

HALF TIME: Heart of Midlothian 2-0 Ross County

“Some of that was outstanding, boys,” I said, pacing around the dressing room at the break. “First half an hour was terrific, some of that one-touch passing as good as I’ve seen from you all season. Then the last quarter of an hour or so you’ve gone to sleep. They’ve had one effort go just over, another where we fell asleep at the far post from the free kick. Listen, fellas, they’re not here to make up the numbers. They beat Rangers last weekend, they’re here to post another scalp. They might have a mountain to climb, but if they get one back all of a sudden it’s a different game. Don’t let it happen, be on it from the first whistle, get the third goal to kill them off.”

Five minutes into the second period and I was on my feet, slightly agitated. Wright and Augusto Loureiro had combined down the visitor’s left flank and the latter’s cross to the far post had seen Mullin outjump Leo Watson and crash his header narrowly over the top.

“Oi!” I screamed. “Get on it!”

From the goal kick, the ball was worked inside to Whelan and his ball through bisected the Ross centre-halves, allowing Uche another chance to complete his hat-trick, this time Kelemen came out to meet him and spreading himself, made a good save to stop our leading scorer from slipping it inside the near post.

The corner kick was then delivered by Montolivo into the near post where it was met by a Christophe Berra header, his run to the near post perfectly timed, however he got just too much on it and it went over the bar.

Two minutes later and Uche was given a third opportunity to make the game safe, this time it was Brandon’s ball forward that the visitors failed to cut out. Once again Uche took a touch too many and once again Kelemen was able to make the block. Still 2-0, it should have been four or five. The ball was cleared for a thrown-in, Leo Watson took it and found Walker, he turned, made some space and struck at goal. Once again Kelemen was equal to the effort, this time diving to his right and turning the ball behind for a corner kick.

The breathless start to the second half continued unabated, play swinging to the other end, Montolivo broke up a promising Ross County move and launched a counter attack that saw four claret shirts pouring forward. Washington slipped Walker in, and the winger, showing the sort of composure shown by Uche since his second goal went for power over subtlety and drove the ball with all his might, wide, almost decapitating the press photographer behind the goal in the process.

A little respite followed for seven or eight minutes, still absorbing stuff, but without the cut and thrust of the previous dozen minutes, then Brandon sent a ball down the right-flank for Naismith and his cross from deep found Walker on the edge of the penalty area, left of the D. As the ball dropped, he struck a fierce effort on the half volley that glanced off the outside of the post on its way behind. Another really good move just missing the finish.

With 7 minutes remaining, Marcus Fraser sent a cross in from the right-hand side which was met neatly by Chalmers who swept the ball beyond Pereira and into the net to set up a grandstand finish. As he wheeled away in celebration, the Assistant on this side raised his flag, Lee Erwin had been offside when the ball was delivered and even though Chalmers was okay, the strike was disallowed.

The let off didn’t last long and the fans weren’t deprived of their exciting finale.

Mullin swung in a free kick less than 80 seconds later that caused mayhem in our box. Morris had a lunging effort blocked and the rebound fell for Henderson who showed real presence of mind to send the ball wide for Chalmers. The winger had a couple of yards of space and whipped an excellent left-footed strike through a ruck of players and into the far corner of the net to reduce the arrears.

Five minutes to play of the 90 remaining.

And it was one-way traffic, the visitors piling on the pressure and our defending becoming ever more desperate. Leo Watson, Jamie Brandon and Christophe Berra all picked up cautions in the closing stages for niggly and cynical attempts to break up the play, something that I wasn’t especially proud of us doing but for those five minutes, any sense of Corinthian spirit deserted us. Did the ends justify the means? Well, we held on and collected the three points…

FULL TIME: Heart of Midlothian 2-1 Ross County

Team: Pereira, Brandon, Souttar (Halkett), Berra, Watson, Montolivo, Whelan (Haring), Naismith, Walker, Ikpeazu (McDonald), Washington

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Table as at Sunday 22nd March 2020:

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Glasgow Celtic

32

25

6

1

72

20

81

52

Glasgow Rangers

32

25

3

4

75

19

78

56

Heart of Midlothian

32

19

7

6

68

42

64

26

Aberdeen

32

17

9

6

49

36

60

13

Kilmarnock

32

12

9

11

37

34

45

3

Motherwell

32

11

8

13

46

48

41

-2

Hibernian

32

9

9

14

46

58

36

-12

St Johnstone

32

8

9

15

36

51

33

-15

St Mirren

32

9

6

17

30

48

33

-18

Livingston

32

5

7

20

29

71

22

-42

Hamilton Academical

32

4

9

19

27

57

21

-30

Ross County

32

5

4

23

29

60

19

-31

 

Friday 20th March 2020

St Johnstone

1

0

St Mirren

 

Saturday 21st March 2020

Aberdeen

1

1

Motherwell

Hamilton

0

2

Hibernian

Hearts

2

1

Ross County

Rangers

2

0

Livingston

 

Sunday 22nd March 2020

Kilmarnock

0

0

Celtic

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With a fortnight between matches due to the Scottish Cup semi-finals, there was plenty of time to prepare for our final match of the regular season against Livingston. After that, we had a three week break for some inexplicable reason, before returning for the final five matches in the terribly mis-monickered ‘Championship Group’. I genuinely do not have a clue who designed the schedule for the SPL, but they sure had an impressive sense of humour.

The two-week gap between matches brought with it some desperately sad news.

We were doing a training drill around set-pieces and Stevie Naismith went up with Peter Haring to contest a corner kick. He won the header but came crashing to earth awkwardly, appearing to land on his head and jar his neck and remained motionless. We immediately sent for Karen Gibson, making sure Stevie didn’t move a muscle, he was clearly in an awful lot of pain.

Within a couple of minutes of Karen arriving, an ambulance was called and she carefully did what she could to try and make him more comfortable before the paramedics arrived. Fully conscious, throughout, we kept Stevie talking and within ten minutes, the ambulance had arrived. Once he’d been taken off to Edinburgh Royal Infirmary, we called a halt to the session, no-one was in the right frame of mind to carry on and I sent the boys home with a promise to let them know on the group chat the moment we heard something.

News arrived in the early evening – partly good, partly not. The good news was overwhelmingly better than the bad, there was nothing more than swelling around Stevie’s spine, none of the bones were out of place so he’d make a full recovery. However, it was likely that he’d be facing another lengthy spell on the sidelines. Compared to what many of us there had feared, that was much better than we were expecting and the relief amongst the lads on the group chat was immense.

I was able to visit him a couple of days later, they were keeping him in until the swelling had subsided. Being led to his bed on the ward by the nurse, I remembered just how much I disliked hospitals, but needs must. He was sitting up, which was good to see, although he had a neck collar on and he looked in enormous discomfort when trying to move. I placed the maroon and white flowers on his bedside table before the nurse took them away to find a vase. “How are you doing, Stevie?” I asked, sitting down and shifting my chair so I was at least in his eyeline.

“Been better, I’ll be honest,” the patient replied.

“Yeah, you don’t look great,” I said. “We were fearing the worst when you hit the deck.”

“Aye, me too, gaffer. It hurt like nothing I’ve ever felt before, like a fierce electric shock going down my back, then I couldn’t move, everything was totally numb.”

“That’s what made Karen so concerned, the fact that you were immobile and unable to feel anything. She didn’t say so, but her face told the story. Everyone’s really relieved that there’s no lasting damage. Have you heard anything about recovery time?”

“Well,” Stevie began before hesitating. “I wanted to discuss that with you.” He tried to shift a little in his bed, but with severe discomfort. “I’m not that long back off a year-long absence and that really took it outta me mentally, I can’t do it again, boss. I’m looking at another 6-months out and even then the docs reckon I’m gonna be feeling pain and really stiff after anything strenuous.”

“What are you saying?” I asked. “This is it for you?”

Stevie took a moment before nodding. “Aye, I think it is, boss. I’m really sorry, but I’ve got a young family and I cannae be forever half cripped.”

“Listen, Stevie, you’ve got to look after number one and do what’s right for you. Don’t rush the decision, though, take time to think it through, talk it through the family and if you’re sure, then of course we back you 100%.”

“I can’t see any way that I’m gonna change my mind, boss, I really cannae face the rehabilitation to get back to prime fitness, that’s if I’m able to at all. But, I’ll do that, I’ll chat with the family and sleep on it for a couple of nights before making my mind up.”

“I think that’d be wise.” I said. “In the meantime, if you do decide to call it a day, have a think about how you want the news to be released, whether it’s something you want to do yourself. If not, I can get Ellie on it and circulate something that you’ve drafted or approved as and when.

“Aye, thanks, boss. I’ll do that.”

We talked for another twenty minutes or so about the Scottish Cup semi-finals that were being played that weekend, about the squad and our season so far, how we were looking to finish strongly in the final half-dozen matches of the campaign before the nurse returned with the flowers and politely shooing be away with the news that the consultant will be round shortly.

Shaking hands, I left him to it with a promise to check in on him, whilst he countered with a promise to let me know his decision over his future as and when.

Three days later the news broke that Steven Naismith, after 399 league appearances north and south of the border and 101 league goals – not to mention his 51 Scottish Caps and 10 international goals – had retired from professional football with immediate effect due to injury. The number and quality of tributes that flowed in from all of his previous clubs and their supporters really did Stevie justice. I’d found him to be nothing but the model professional, who went out of his way to help the younger boys in training and on the pitch as well has being a player of the highest quality. He was going to leave a huge void both in the dressing room and on the field that’d be very difficult to fill.

In other news which, by comparison to a man’s career coming to a premature end was rather small fry, particularly considering it didn’t mean the end of my career by any stretch, was the fact with just eight weeks remaining on my contract there was still not sign of movement on a renewal. Still, I refused to broach the fact with the board, although my dealings were becoming a little more tepid on my side, equally I refused to break ranks at all and go public with my concerns. Instead, I was working on a little timetable and, should nothing appear by the time I was leading the side into the opening game of the 5-match Championship group, then I’d begin to move the wheels a little myself.

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Saturday 4th April 2020: Livingston v Heart of Midlothian (SPL)

Venue: The Tony Macaroni Arena

Att: 6,955

We finished the regular season with a relatively local trip to Livingston, see if we could finish things on a high before the three-week break and the final few weeks of what had been a gruelling, but enjoyable season to date. If we could see things through to a 3rd place finish, I’d have been delighted with my inaugural campaign in football management. There was a lot of football still to be played between now and then, including two more matches against the Old Firm. It was far from in the bag.

Obviously, we were a little lighter in the attacking third with the retirement of Stevie Naismith, Jamie Walker switched from the left flank into the attacking midfield role whilst Ryo Meshino returned on the left-flank. Otherwise, Aidan White and Craig Halkett returned in defence and Jamie Brandon was once again at right-back in the continuing absence of the banned Michael Smith.

We began blisteringly, albeit illegally. A ball into the box from Brandon wide on the right found its way to Ryo Meshino, just beyond the far post after two defenders missed their clearance. The Japanese winger neatly knocked it inside for Conor Washington to sweep beyond Matija Sarkic in the Livi goal for what we thought was our opener. A fraction after the ball had hit the net the flag was raised for an apparent offside. At first I thought he’d given it for when the initial cross from Brandon went in, but after a zillion slow-motion replays, it showed that Conor was half-a-yard off from Ryo’s ball into him in the second phase.

That was after just a minute of play.

10 minutes later, Conor won the aerial flick on and found Uche with his header. His strike partner held the ball up nicely before finding Ryo with a neat reverse ball inside him. The winger got the ball momentarily trapped under his feet and had to turn away from goal before hitting a strike on the turn that beat Sarkic but came back off the post. Washington reacted quickest and slipped the loose ball home. Once again he wheeled away and once again the official’s flag was straight up. The Ulsterman had been adjudged offside when Ryo struck his shot although he was as far onside this time as he’d been offside with the previous effort. Still, there was no VAR and the goal was chalked off. We had to take it on the chin.

Instead, we sulked.

We sulked and we stopped playing. So, when a long clearance fell for Livingston’s lone strike Lyndon Dykes to run and hold up, waiting for support and when he picked out Keaghan Jacobs with a gorgeous pass and when Jacobs’ drop of the shoulder suckered Craig Halkett completely it wasn’t entirely a massive surprise when he drove the ball low and hard beyond the dive of Joel Pereira into the bottom corner of the net to give the hosts the lead. It was a devastating and brilliant counter-attack.

Nine minutes later another mistake from Halkett saw him scuff his attempted clearance down the left-flank and Jacobs again set off towards goal completely unchallenged. This time Pereira was equal to the South African wide-midfielder’s effort and made a fine save to his right, holding onto the ball with Dykes sniffing for any rebound.

In the 37th minute we finally managed to create something worthwhile after more than 25-minutes of complete and utter drivel, Walker released Washington with a smashing through ball and the striker’s effort looked to be headed for the top of the net before Sarkic intervened and excellently clawed the ball behind for a corner kick and then five minutes later, a ball over the top from White put Washington through again, this time his effort bordered on the pathetic as he shot tamely at Sarkic when one-on-one.

We paid the price a minute before the break when from a deep free kick into the penalty area, Halkett capped his miserable first-half by climbing all over Ricki Lamie trying to win the aerial challenge. The referee almost apologetically pointed to the spot, as if to say ‘I really can’t believe I’m having to do this, Halks’ – Lamie did the rest from the spot, smashing the ball beyond Pereira’s dive to double the Livi lead and give them an unlikely 2-goal advantage at the break.

HALF TIME: Livingston 2-0 Heart of Midlothian

They’d gone 16-games with a win before this one, their last three points had come in mid-December. In that time, they’d picked up just three points. Three points out of a possible 48. My usually calm demeanour found itself severely tested, once again as I strode into the dressing room.

I did slam the door behind me but, somehow when speaking I kept my calm. “This lot don’t know what it’s like to win a game, they’ve forgotten how to do it,” I said perched on the edge of physio’s bed. “Put that first half beyond you, you’ve had an absolute shocker. The moment you score, and you will score, just watch them retreat, watch them panic, watch them not know what to do with the ball. So, stop feeling sorry for yourselves, take the game to them and you’ll come back with something. No question.”

When we returned to action, we’d found the heavens had opened and so footing was a little tricky, so was judging passes as the top surface became slicker. Eventually we found our range, a ball chipped into Washington was headed on to Uche and he threaded a lovely ball through for Meshino, unfortunately the strike at goal was straight at Sarkic and the goalkeeper made a comfortable save.

Five minutes later, just past the hour mark I made a double change with Craig Wighton and Jake Mulraney coming on for Meshino and Washington, both of whom had spurned our best chances of the afternoon so far. It didn’t take too long for the change to pay dividends.

A deep cross from Jamie Brandon overshot Uche and Wights but was picked up by Mulraney. The Irishman, who had been out-of-favour starting only four matches since the winter break, kept the ball in play and then cut it back for Jamie Walker who, on the penalty spot, took a touch before drilling the ball low beyond Sarkic to get us back into the contest with his first goal since the beginning of November.

Now we’d see if my half-time words had been accurate or simple bullsh-.

From the kick-off, a rushed ball forward from the back found only Jamie Brandon, he went inside to John Souttar who brought the ball forward before spotting the run of Uche off the shoulder of his marker. The pass was perfectly judged as was Uche’s run. Out came Sarkic, but the leading goalscorer simply slipped the ball underneath him and into the back of the net to level things up. The goal had come just 14-seconds after the restart.

I’ll admit I allowed a wry smile to pass over my lips as the celebrations went on of mile satisfaction.

Within 3½ minutes of getting our first goal, the entire game had been turned totally on its head. Glenn Whelan led the charge after Souttar had cleared a free kick into the box with a fine header, eventually the ball had been worked out to the left where Mulraney’s blocked cross had fallen invitingly for White. His cross picked out Uche who, from about 10 yards out glanced the ball goalwards. To be honest, Sarkic should have saved the effort, instead he kind of dived over it somewhat as it slipped through his grasp and into the back of the net. Uche ran off to celebrate a 26th strike of the campaign whilst the away fans behind that goal could barely believe what they’d witnessed. Nor could I. I did genuinely believe that if we scored we’d go onto to win the game, I didn’t think we’d go 3-2 up with just under 20 minutes remaining though.

For those final 20 minutes we finally managed to play our natural game and look every inch the decent side I thought we were. With the game just ticking into to stoppage time, Uche managed to stop a ball going out of play before turning and dinking a chip across to the far post. Stealing in was Jake Mulraney to nod home completely unmarked from an improbably tight angle and become the third player to make it into double figures for the season. It was the Irish winger’s first goal since the week before Christmas and after a tough little spell of form, brought enormous cheer and smiles to his face.

It had been a scintillating 25-minute spell showing just what we were capable of. There was something of the Jekyll & Hyde about us at times which, I supposed, was borne of not quite having the level of quality available to us that Celtic and Rangers had, but it certainly made for the occasional entertaining afternoon and evening in the dugout.

I refrained from giving the players a little ‘told you so’ after the game, relying instead on giving them four-days off before we began once again to look ahead to our final five matches of the campaign to see if we could secure our place in Europe.

FULL TIME: Livingston 2-4 Heart of Midlothian

Team: Pereira, Brandon, Souttar, Halkett, White, Montolivo, Whelan, Walker, Meshino (Mulraney), Ikpeazu, Washington (Wighton)

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Table as at Saturday 4th April 2020:

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Glasgow Celtic

33

26

6

1

75

21

84

54

Glasgow Rangers

33

25

3

5

75

21

78

54

Heart of Midlothian

33

20

7

6

72

44

67

28

Aberdeen

33

18

9

6

51

36

63

15

Kilmarnock

33

12

10

11

37

34

46

3

Motherwell

33

11

8

14

47

51

41

-4

Hibernian

33

9

10

14

46

58

37

-12

St Johnstone

33

8

10

15

37

52

34

-15

St Mirren

33

9

6

18

31

52

33

-21

Hamilton Academical

33

5

9

19

31

58

24

-27

Livingston

33

5

7

21

31

75

22

-44

Ross County

33

5

5

23

30

61

20

-31

 

Saturday 4th April

Aberdeen

2

0

Rangers

Celtic

3

1

Motherwell

Hibs

0

0

Kilmarnock

Livingston

2

4

Hearts

Ross County

1

1

St Johnstone

St Mirren

1

4

Hamilton

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“Okay, so you know what to do?” I asked.

“Yes, got it Jones. If I don’t hear from you by 7pm then I can go live with the story as breaking news.”

“I really hope it doesn’t come to that,” I said.

“Are you sure this is what you want?”

“Want? Absolutely not. But I don’t see what choice I have now. I’ve waited and waited and waited, I’ve been extremely patient and to no avail. I’ve gone to them, almost cap in hand now and am being ignored. If, by 7pm Saturday there is no movement, you can go with the story.”

There was a pause.

“Good luck, Jones. Hope things work out.”

“Me too, Leah. Me too.”

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Saturday 25th April 2020: Heart of Midlothian v Motherwell (SPL Championship Group)

 

Venue: Tynecastle

 

Att: 19,547

 

Three weeks is a long time to keep your players focused on the job in hand. I kept my mumbles and grumbles around the scheduling of the fixtures very much to myself rather than going public but I knew talking to other managers that my thinking was along the same lines as their own. It simply made no sense at all. But, it was what it was and complaining to the blazered folk that ran our wonderful game would be a pointless and futile exercise.

Speaking of pointless and futile, the notion of a ‘Championship’ group had also been rendered almost pointless by Rangers’ refusal to see the campaign through to its conclusion. Their defeat at Aberdeen on the final day of the regular season had all but ended their challenge. Celtic, with a six-point gap looked odds-on now to complete their ninth straight title win. Even if the Gers won the final Old Firm clash, they needed the help of at least two other clubs to be able to overhaul their city rivals. Things were much more interesting at the bottom of the table.

The break saw us hit with another injury hammer-blow, once again it was an aerial challenge that saw Uche, this time, crash to earth awkwardly and dislocate his shoulder. Immediately it was obviously a season ending injury and one we could ill-afford. We weren’t overstocked with attackers, and the two I now had at my disposal were Conor Washington, who had netted once in his previous 13 appearances and Craig Wighton who, by all accounts appeared to have exhausted his goal return for this campaign. I would be forced to bring someone into the squad from the reserves and Under-23s, we tried a few options in training and by far the most promising was young Jay Charleston-King, who’d made his debut at home to Elgin back in July. He’d only just turned 17 but looked the best of the options available to us. The only question for the visit of our whipping boys, Motherwell, was whether to throw him into the starting line-up or go with Craig and use him off the bench.

Jay got the nod, it was just a hunch, but I thought he’d swim rather than sink.

We began the game looking all the while as if we were going to add another four or five to our extensive tally against Motherwell for the season. Souttar collected a long kick downfield from Trevor Carson, taking it down nicely before passing halfway and slipping it right to Michael Smith, who’d returned from suspension to resume duties at right-back. He knocked it inside for Walker who looked for the run of Charleston-King. It was intercepted by Charles Dunne, who played a pass-back for Carson. He’d left it short though and the young striker continued his run, getting there just before the Northern Ireland goalkeeper and firing low into the far corner. Less than five minutes into his league debut and he’d poached his first ever senior goal. What a moment for the young lad and his family watching on from the stands.

That wasn’t the signal for the floodgates to open much as I thought it might be. Instead things became attritional in the extreme and we really struggled to impose ourselves. Motherwell’s three-man midfield was difficult for us to get to grips with and Jamie Walker was required increasingly to drop back to make up a three with Glenn Whelan and Ricci Montolivo. Defensively we were strong, but for all Jay’s enthusiasm we did also sorely lack the focal point given to us by Uche up front.

Still, we went in a goal ahead at the break and, at this stage, results were more important than performances.

HALF TIME: Heart of Midlothian 1-0 Motherwell

 

“You know we’re lacking a bit of quality out there today,” I said to the boys at the break, “but if you keep at least matching their work-rate you’ll be fine. Okay? Three points today and that gives us a great opportunity to close out 3rd spot. Aberdeen are 3-1 down to Celtic so they’ll need something big to overhaul us in the final four matches. Keep it going, stay tight, stay compact without the ball – as and when chances come make sure you take them.”

A simple enough message I thought, encourage, try and take the pressure to entertain off and just have the boys focus on doing the basics right.

Seven minutes after the restart, Motherwell came darned close to bringing themselves level. Richard Tait did extremely well down the right flank and deliver a super cross into the heart of the penalty area where Chirs Long did brilliantly to beat Souttar to the header. He got plenty of purchase on his effort but directed it agonisingly past Pereira’s right-hand post. The goalkeeper was concerned enough to launch himself full-stretch to his right.

In the 58th minute a mistake from Meshino saw him give the ball away by playing a blind pass to where Halkett had been an instant before but where Michal Skvarka now lurked. It turned into a perfect through-ball for the Motherwell attacking midfielder and he burst in on goal. This time Pereira, again plunging to his right, was called upon to make the save, and he did so excellently to keep us ahead.

That was Meshino’s final part of the afternoon as he was replaced by Mulraney and ten minutes later Wighton came on for Jay, who was afforded a terrific ovation from the Tynecastle faithful. He’d been forced to live off scraps but did so enthusiastically and his goal had come about through chasing an apparent lost cause.

Motherwell were fully committed to trying to get something from the game, a break down the left saw Grant Ward get beyond the challenge of Smith and burst into the penalty area. He had three men waiting for the cut-back but went for glory himself and Pereira saved comfortably.

With four minutes remaining, Conor Washington’s dismal lack of confidence in front of goal once again struck, a slick move down the left-flank (a rare flash of quality throughout the afternoon) saw Mulraney slip White clear. The full-back’s low cross was perfect for Washington who found himself in space. The striker took a touch to set himself before shooting. His shot lacked conviction though and Carson was able to make a comfortable save.

Two minutes into stoppage time, it was Craig Wighton’s lack of natural killer instinct that saw another excellent chance to seal the points go begging, when he was found by Walker’s neat pass in behind Dunne. The substitute worked himself a good angle and struck low and hard across goal, unfortunately it went wide of the far post and behind for a goal-kick.

In the final minute of the five additional minutes Jake Mulraney took on Liam Polworth and found his progress checked illegally. Polworth had already been booked and the official deemed his offence worthy of a second caution. To me, it seemed a little unnecessary to dismiss the midfielder given that there were only a dozen or so more second remaining of the encounter. Still, the red card was brandished and the Motherwell man trudged off down the tunnel a minute or so before his team-mates.

We’d held on, weathered that 20-minute storm at the start of the second half and come away with a crucial three points. Aberdeen had lost 4-2 at home to Celtic so that opened up a six-point gap between ourselves and the Pittodrie side in third spot, I was very happy with that and waited by the tunnel to shake the hands of each of my players as they came off the pitch.

There wasn’t much to be said afterwards in the dressing room except a quick well-done and to make sure the boys signed Jay’s shirt for him as a memento of his goalscoring league debut. Then it was off for the press conference in which I talked about my happiness with the result, then waxed lyrical about Jay’s efforts and how his goal came from an in-built knowledge about where to be to score, something you couldn’t teach. At the end, I caught Leah’s eye and shook my head. She nodded in acknowledgement. I checked my watch, it wasn’t yet 6pm.

Time for me then to go upstairs to the sponsor’s lounge and seek out Ann Budge for a quick chat.

FULL TIME: Heart of Midlothian 1-0 Motherwell

Team: Pereira, Smith, Souttar, Halkett, White, Montolivo, Whelan, Walker, Meshino (Mulraney), Charleston-King (Wighton), Washington

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Table as at Saturday 25th April 2020:

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Glasgow Celtic

34

27

6

1

79

23

87

56

Glasgow Rangers

34

26

3

5

77

21

81

56

Heart of Midlothian

34

21

7

6

73

44

70

29

Aberdeen

34

18

9

7

53

40

63

13

Kilmarnock

34

12

10

12

37

36

46

1

Motherwell

34

11

8

15

47

52

41

-5

Hibernian

34

10

10

14

49

58

40

-9

St Johnstone

34

8

10

16

38

54

34

-16

St Mirren

34

9

6

19

31

54

33

-23

Hamilton Academical

34

6

9

19

33

58

27

-25

Livingston

34

6

7

21

33

76

25

-43

Ross County

34

5

5

24

30

64

20

-34

 

Saturday 25th April

Aberdeen

2

4

Celtic

Hearts

1

0

Motherwell

Rangers

2

0

Kilmarnock

Hibs

3

0

Ross County

Livingston

2

1

St Johnstone

St Mirren

0

2

Hamilton

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It took a little while to get to see Ann, as I walked across the lounge multiple well-wishers stopped me to say a word of congratulations, get something signed or to have a photo taken with them. I wasn’t one of those people that didn’t want to give something back to those that had made the effort to sponsor the club, or come and support us, so I gave what time I could without seeming off-hand and rude.

“Excuse me,” I said once I’d finally reached Ann, who was speaking to someone who I recognised from the main club sponsor.

“Oh, Jones,” one of the suited men who seemed to have grown rich on the bubbles provided by the best champagne capitalist money could buy. “Well done today, not one of the better games, eh?”

“No, it wasn’t. But at this point it’s all about gaining the three points and securing third place.” I said. “I’d take that scrappy 1-0 win over losing 4-3 today. Would you mind if I just borrowed Ann for a couple of minutes please?” I asked.

“No, of course, by all means, don’t let us get in the way of business.” He offered a handshake which I accepted, and that from him companion as well.

“Thanks, we won’t be long.” I said. “Sorry, Ann, is the boardroom free?” I asked.

“Yes, it should be,” she said, and I followed her through the door into the neighbouring boardroom.

“What can I do for you, Jones?” She closed the door behind us. The room was quite dark, the only light was filtering in through the semi-closed blinds drawn over the windows overlooking the pitch.

“Well, Ann.” I took a deep breath before continuing. “You’ll have seen my note the other week concerning the lack of a new deal?” She nodded. “Well, I have less than five weeks to run and there’s been no indication that I’m going to be offered a new one so.” I reached into the inside pocket of my coat, picked out an envelope and handed it across to her.

“What’s this, Jones?” She asked quizzically.

“It’s my intention to leave at the end of the season.” I said. “I feel I’ve been extremely patient in waiting for an extension to materialise, I feel the side has made plenty of progress this term, we’re likely to finish third in the table and yet with a month remaining there’s nothing on the table, not an offer, not even an indication that I’m going to be offered anything.”

She opened the envelope and began to scan the letter. “Sky Sports News will be breaking the story in about,” I looked at my watch, “half-an-hour or so.” I said. “They won’t be saying anything about why I’ve decided to leave the club at this stage, just that we’ve met and that I’ll be leaving the club after the expiry of my contract. Unless, of course..”

Ann looked up. “Yes?”

“Well, unless you wish to terminate it here and now.”

She looked taken aback. “Is that what you want?”

“Of course not,” I said. “I’ve come too far this season to want to leave before the job is done for the season.”

She replaced the letter into the envelope. “And if I refuse to accept this?” She waved it in my direction.

I shrug. “Well, there’s nothing for me to sign is there in terms of a new deal, so for the next few weeks we’d be at stalemate until my current deal comes to an end and I leave anyway.”

“And if I commit to offering a new deal here and now?” She said. “I can persuade the rest of the board.”

“Is that what’s been holding this up?” I ask. “Your fellow board members? I know some of them didn’t want me to take the job in the first place.”

“I’m not going to go into that. You have my concrete guarantee, Jones, there will be a new contract offer on the table.”

I waited half a beat. “When?”

“Before your current one runs out.” She said.

“Not good enough, Ann. Sorry.” I replied. “What’s in that letter stands. If you wish me to see out the remaining few weeks of my current deal I will do so with the greatest of pleasure. I will not, however, sign a new one if one is presented to me whatever the terms.”

“Why won’t you even consider a new one?” She asked.

“That window’s closed now, Ann. If I’d had even some level of indication that you wanted me to sign a new deal even a month ago and were working on the terms, we wouldn’t be at this point now.” I said. “But that didn’t happen and here we are. Sorry, but I’ve got to look after myself and I need some level of security or certainty as to what is happening in the future. Look, I’ve kept you long enough, I’m going to head home before the news breaks, I’ll leave it up to you and the board to put out any statement in response, I’m saying nothing publicly until next week. Thanks for your time and I’ll see you on Wednesday for our catch-up.”

With that I turned and walked over to the other door at the far end of the room before exiting to go and collect my bag.

When I left the ground I could see the camera set up outside the main entrance. I looked around and saw Leah hunched over a monitor. “Leah?” She looked over and said something to her crew before striding over.

“Jones, is it all done?” She asked.

“Yeah.” I replied. “I feel absolutely wretched.”

“It had to be done, you know that.” She reached over and put a hand on mine. “You said so yourself. How did she take it?”

“I don’t know really, a cocktail of disbelief and surprise, I think.”

“It’ll be interesting to see what their next move is.”

“It will. Are you guys all set to go?” I asked.

“Yeah, we’re first story up at 7. Will you watch?”

“I’ll probably tune in for a minute, yeah. Do you want to come over once you’re all done here?” I asked.

“Sure thing, I’ll probably be here for a couple of hours to try and get some voxpops in reaction to the news.”

“Not a problem, I won’t be getting much sleep tonight I think.”

“See you later then,” she said, reaching up on tiptoes to give me a kiss on my cheek before returning to the crew to put the finishing touches ahead of her broadcast.

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