Gordon tempers expectations with dose of reality

CRAIG Gordon may only have been a 15-year-old boys' club player during Hearts' last shot at the league championship, but the Scotland goalkeeper remembers enough from those heady days to keep his feet firmly on the ground in the midst of the club's current run of form.

The young Gordon took part in a half-time penalty shoot-out contest on 16 May, 1998, as his boyhood heroes ended a 36-year trophy drought by winning the Scottish Cup against Rangers, but what transpired the following season, when the team slumped into a relegation battle, remains equally prominent in the 22-year-old's mind.

Speaking yesterday, as the club launched their new national rate telephone number at Tynecastle, Gordon said: "This is probably the most exciting it has been here since 1998. It was only in the last few weeks of the season that Hearts fell away, but still managed to win the cup. I think it's the most excited the fans have been since, and the players realise that the expectation is there, so hopefully we can deal with that as well as we have done so far.

"I was playing boys' club football, but was very excited with the way things were panning out. Hearts went on a good winning run, and were looking as if they could nick the title but it all fell flat the next season when they almost got relegated before recovering to finish sixth.

"So hopefully that doesn't happen to us, and we can go from strength to strength. We're looking to have a good season this season, and really build towards the future."

Gordon is already looking ahead to welcoming new members to the threadbare Tynecastle squad when the transfer window re-opens in January.

"The players have done very well to get us into this position," added the goalkeeper, "and I'm sure everyone thinks they could continue with the job, but there isn't a massive first team squad and a few injuries or suspensions would bring in a lot more inexperienced or younger players.

"So if we do strengthen with better quality players, it would give us a great chance of going on to bigger and better things."

There have been no recent talks over Gordon's own future, and despite reported recent interest from Italian side Palermo, the Edinburgh-born player insists he is in no immediate rush to have his future resolved.

He said: "It's fairly quiet on that front at the moment, and I still have a year left after this one, so there's plenty time to talk about that."

And Gordon also took time to praise the influence of Hibernian on both this season's SPL title race, and football in Edinburgh.

"There's two good teams, they're both at the right end of the league, battling for major honours, and I think that's great for the city," said Gordon. "It's been a while since that's happened, so I'm sure both sets of fans will be delighted with the way their teams have progressed this season."

Taken from the Scotsman