Plenty spills but few thrills

Brian Meek

18 Nov 1996

THE turnstiles at Tynecastle are notoriously narrow; one rather large gent had to ask the police to allow him in a side door, he was so worried about being stuck.

"Wallace Mercer designed them to keep out Hibs supporters," the man on the gate quipped.

The Great Waldo, who was over on a flying visit from French havens, would have been doing them a favour.

This was your other national derby.

If you thought the Celtic-Rangers stramash on Thursday night lacked a certain sublety, was a wee bit short on the skill factor, this, by comparison, was the remedial class; it had all the delicacy of a stair-heid rammy.

Nobody won and nobody deserved to; even the ref was rotten.

"Form goes out of the window on these occasions," home manager Jim Jefferies reflected in the programme.

Sure, along with style, craft, and common sense.

There were, of course, some good players.

Willie Miller was immense in the heart of the Hibs' defence and Jim Leighton carried on where he left off against Sweden, even though he was booked after protesting too much about John Hughes' sending off.

What a farce that was.

Hughes, who does not favour a nudge when a full-scale clatter is called for, is never going to be the pin-up of match officials.

He is wholehearted in the sense that he is going to shake up your whole heart.

He came up for a corner and had a slight tangle with Hearts' French goalkeeper Gilles Rousset.

Hughes refused the offer of a handshake which appeared to infuriate another Hearts' import, Stephane Paille, who raced towards him.

As they met Hughes pushed him away.

Paille fell as though he had been gunned down by a Browning automatic.

The referee, John Rowbotham, who had seen none of this, dashed off to consult one of his assistants.

Red card for Hughes, Oscar for Paille.

Football really does not need this nonsense.

As Hughes said afterwards: "Where in the rules does it say I have to shake hands with the goalie? I'll do that at the end, not in the middle of a game." Anyway, let us put this dreadful game behind us and look forward.

Hearts, to the considerable credit of Jefferies and his colleagues, will be playing in their second successive cup final on Sunday, attempting again to lower the banners of Rangers.

Their chairman, Chris Robinson, is a cheerful realist.

"I think it is actually becoming harder to keep pace with Rangers and Celtic these days, but we keep on trying.

We have no objection about playing in cup finals until we get it right." To pursue the cup final angle further I sought out Hibs' veteran Ray Wilkins.

He had sat out the game on the bench, his manager, Jocky Scott, deciding that it was not going to be Ray's kind of contest.

Anyway, Wilkins' time at Ibrox and his ringside view of Hearts made him the ideally qualified commentator on the final.

As always he was polite and helpful in his answers, the model pro from whom, one hopes the Hibs players are actually learning.

"I would say Hearts have got to play with fire in their bellies, but also with some control and shrewdness.

They will have to think out a game plan and stick to it." So what, Ray, would be your advice to the Jambos? "They could board up the goal." Which was, perhaps, the best line of a bad day.

There was another laugh as well.

At the interval Hearty Harry, the club mascot, was prancing round the pitch, took off his mask and turned out to be Ally McCoist.

If only he had been able to stay.

Taken from the Herald