The Better Team Won And Don’t You
Forget It:
Hearts 2 Motherwell 1
Don’t anyone pay
attention to foolhards. Hearts were the better team, at the kick-off, at the start of the
second half, and at the full time whistle.
For some mysterious reason Hearts chose not to be the better team for half an hour between 50 and 80
minutes but the last ten minutes were disconcertingly comfortable considering
what had gone before. So don’t go
getting all worried on us. The
first half was quite an assured display and 1-0 was the right score at the
break. It all seemed a little
overcautious as the midfield was playing a bit deep and the full backs weren’t
getting forward enough, but Motherwell’s recent record (especially against us)
is impressive, so perhaps security was paramount early on, and Hearts’ crisp
passing and good movement suggested there weren’t going to be problems. Once the first goal was scored – out of the
top drawer, by the way – the football we were playing suggested a comfortable
if not devastating victory. It’s been
a long time since we have lost a game after taking the lead, and recent
displays especially have been characterised by competing strongly in the first
half to win the midfield space and then going on to exploit that space in the
second half to win the game. McFadden’s
speed and skill seemed all Hearts had to worry about – apart from themselves,
that is…
Of course, had Valois knocked in a second shortly after half-time none of
this discussion might be going on, but from that moment onwards Hearts were
struck down by footballing blight as though they’d put their boots back on the
wrong foot while sipping their half-time cuppa. If it’s true that a team plays as well as
the other lets it, then Motherwell were brilliant only because Hearts were utterly calamitous. This was proven in the last ten minutes when
suddenly we remembered how to play football and it all became very easy
again. Motherwell had only what we
gave them – in the first half crumbs, in the second a banquet. I have no idea why it all happened – all
I can say is Thank God we weren’t flying
a plane - but one of Craig Levein’s qualities is that he learns lessons and
does something to make it not happen again.
It’s one of the good things about inexperienced managers, rather than
warhorse managers who are veterans of the game (the sort that
make substitutions a little bit too late – with me on this one, sports
fans? More later.) We got away with it, sure, but Hearts have
earned many of their victories this season with hard work and application, so I
for one will not feel embarrassed when someone cuts us a slice of luck.
Equally, some
individual performances were so out of character that we can draw a line
beneath them and be assured they won’t happen often again. Everything
It seemed odd for Craig
Levein to replace Neil McFarlane with Stephen Simmonds
when keeping possession of the ball was the one things Hearts desperately
needed, but we (and Levein himself) might for once allow the manager some
credit for a tactically-deep substitution: he later said Hearts were not
attacking enough. “I wanted to change
where the game was being played,” he said, and in a sentence he has banished
the notion he lacks tactical awareness.
Something was wrong and he did something about it before it was too
late. Only one football writer called it right (alone
from the sour
grape merchants from every other newspaper): “Levein decided to ease the pressure on his
defence by asking more questions of Motherwell’s.” (The same writer, too, was
the only one to notice that Motherwell’s Pearson didn’t get his second yellow card
after hacking down Stamp in the first half).
While the question of
player confidence most certainly is Craig Levein’s brief for which he should be
held accountable, it
was hardly his fault that everyone suddenly starting playing rubbish –
everyone, that is, apart from the imperious Phil Stamp whom A
Seer, A Sage has correctly
identified as Hearts’ Player of the Season.
No doubts now. Stamp did it the
A moment of rare
quality – not just in this game, but any game – was Hearts’ first goal: a fast
accurate pass from Severin found the ever-willing
Wales, and his careful pass inside was weighted so perfectly that it required
no break in stride for McKenna to collect it, drop the shoulder to create
himself a yard of shooting space and unleash a shot right off the sweet spot
that gave the Motherwell ‘keeper the chance to stand there with his hands on
his hips in true foreign-goalie fashion (“You expect me to SAVE that?”) It was so deadly efficient in build-up and
execution you would have thought