Pressley looks to future after his TV torture

STEVEN PRESSLEY sat in his New Town home last week and watched an afternoon of Scottish Cup shocks unfold on the television screen in front of him.

Sent home from Tynecastle with a stomach bug and unable to find the radio commentary on his hi-fi, the Hearts skipper waited for the goal flashes come through one by one.

It’s no way to follow your team and Pressley, who has missed only a handful of games in four seasons at Hearts, endured it miserably.

However, by the time First Division shock-troops Ayr United had grabbed the early headlines by taking a 2-0 lead against Dunfermline, he could not have imagined how bad it would get.

At 4.45pm, Hearts were out, beaten 3-1 by Inverness Caley Thistle. Not for the first time that week, Pressley must have felt sick.

Tomorrow, the Scotland defender returns to a Gorgie side aiming to make amends for their cup exit. Trouble is, they’re due at East End Park to face a Dunfermline outfit, eventually beaten 3-0, who are equally determined to bounce back.

"Both sides have an opportunity this weekend to redeem themselves, so it makes for a very interesting game," said Pressley.

"We won 1-0 up there at the start of the season. Scott Severin scored a fantastic goal that day, and we played exceptionally well as a team. It’s going to take a similar sort of performance to get a result tomorrow."

If last week’s result-to-forget did anything, it highlighted the importance of the 28-year-old former Rangers and Dundee United star to the team.

Even allowing for the fact that Kevin McKenna was also missing - tomorrow’s Gold Cup third-place play-off means the Canadian international is ruled out again - most fans argue that Pressley’s presence at the back would have posed a more testing problem for Inverness.

However, it is not a subject the captain is happy discussing. "We win as a team and we lose as a team," said Pressley.

"Whether I’m playing or not, I’m part of this team; part of the squad, so I take it as badly as everyone else. Obviously, I was extremely disappointed on Saturday. But then, everyone involved with Hearts was extremely disappointed by the result. The expectations have been high in recent weeks and we know it was a game we should have won.

"I suppose that’s the beauty of the cup; it does throw up some upsets. Of course, we didn’t want to be one of them."

Watching the game on teletext is a surreal experience, especially for someone who lives to kick every ball. It’s bad enough on the rare occasions Pressley is injured or suspended and he has to sit in the stand. When ‘Tokely 26’ was followed by ‘Wales 45’ he must have breathed more easily.

But then, in the second half, ‘Wyness 57’ and ‘Bagan 73’ flashed up in front of his eyes. The novelty value of Dunfermline’s scoreline, and notions about the romance of the Cup, quickly disappeared. "It was probably the first time in many years that I’ve had to sit at home and watch the videoprinter on television," added Pressley, "and it was very difficult.

"I was thinking it certainly was an upset at Ayr because you always expect the Premier League side to go through.

"Dunfermline have been going really well of late and haven’t been conceding many goals. But, at the end of the day, the Dunfermline result wasn’t a concern of mine. I was just concerned about our result."

Concerned but utterly helpless, Pressley could only sit in his armchair - he didn’t say whether he was pacing about - and hope the advice he has passed down to young team-mates Andy Webster and Severin, on the training field and throughout this season, was being heeded.

"That’s why I like to play every week," he added. "For the last five or six years I’ve not missed too many games and the main reason for that is because I hate sitting and having no control over things."

As it happened, Webster and Severin, partnering Stephane Mahe in a back three, put in solid but unspectacular displays. Pressley said: "You do get ups and downs as a young lad - you get them as an older player too! - but Andy is a very level-headed lad and he’s played exceptionally well this season. Considering his age and lack of experience, he acquitted himself very well."

It is typical of Pressley to dwell on the positive, although he is equally quick to point out that he didn’t pay to watch the game, nor did he have to endure the disappointing fall from grace of the 1998 winners.

"No, it’s difficult for me to assess what happened on the pitch because I wasn’t there," he said, "but I suppose, from a psychological point of view, one of the positives is that we know what’s in front of us now.

"We know there is no possibility of silverware this season, so our aspirations have to be to continue gaining points and close the gap on Livingston in third place.

"We know what the rest of the season represents for us now and we have to continue trying to make strides in that time."

With that, Pressley stood up tentatively and headed for Hearts physio Alan Rae’s treatment room, having received a kick in the thigh during the morning training session. After last weekend, you don’t need to ask if he will be playing tomorrow.

Taken from the Scotsman