Hearts pay price for poor first-leg performance

Sparta Prague 0 - 0 Hearts

HEARTS' European adventure ended honourably yet disappointingly in Prague last night as they failed to overcome a two-goal deficit from the home leg. Both their play and attitude were substantially better than at Murrayfield, and they had several decent chances in each half. Sparta Prague, however, were at least as strong, and in the end progressed comfortably to the group stages of the UEFA Cup.

Going out of this competition, following their elimination from the third qualifying round of the Champions League, hardly measures up to Vladimir Romanov's grand vision for the club, but they have at least restored a measure of solidity which was glaringly absent some weeks ago. It had been a tall order, in any case, to come back from two goals down after the home leg - in fact, no Scottish team have previously managed it in half a century of European competition. Steven Pressley, who equalled Henry Smith's club record of 22 European appearances last night, will thus have to wait another season at least before establishing a new mark of his own.

Being knocked out of Europe can help a team in domestic competition, as was shown by Celtic last season, but that can be no more than a slight consolation. After all, Craig Levein's more limited squad reached the group stages two years ago, excelling themselves in doing so. Valdas Ivanauskas's players, conversely, are still playing below their own abilities, and have yet to prove more than the sum of their parts.

Valdas Ivanauskas made four changes, two of them enforced, from the team which had beaten Aberdeen four days earlier. Robbie Neilson was back in place of Ibrahim Tall, Julien Brellier took over in central midfield from the cup-tied Marius Zaliukas, Deividas Cesnauskis was in for the suspended Neil McCann, and Jamie Mole was preferred to Roman Bednar as Mauricio Pinilla's striking partner.

Ivanauskas had said he was going to pick his strongest team for the visit to Pittodrie, but the two optional alterations to last night's starting line-up both made footballing sense. Tall is a far stronger and more confident player than he was when he joined the club, but Neilson has a greater understanding with the centre-backs, besides which his long throw-in is often a potent weapon. Mole is still very inexperienced, but when he made his first start in Athens in the Champions League qualifier he showed no fear and gave the formidable figure of Traianos Dellas a difficult evening.

Besides Mole's virtues, there was the fact that Bednar had failed to shine in his previous outings. It was Juho Makela who stood out against Alloa with a hat-trick, and Pinilla who made the difference at Aberdeen. The message to Bednar was that he would have a chance to make an impact in his own homeland, but would be given a limited time in which to do so after coming off the bench.

Both Mole and Neilson were in action in the first minute, with the young striker pressurising the home defence into conceding a throw-in which Neilson launched into the box. Sparta coped with it, however, with Jaromir Blazek comfortably collecting the second ball.

Hearts were well aware they had to get off to a solid start, but if anything they were slightly too eager to impose themselves on their Czech opponents, as was shown by the unnecessary concession of free-kicks by both Cesnauskis and Saulius Mikoliunas. Giving away free-kicks was one thing, but the unnecessary concession of a goal would clearly have been a lot worse. That was what nearly happened in the sixth minute, though, when, after two Sparta corners in quick succession, a header by Zdenek Pospech was cleared from under his own crossbar by Hartley. Jan Simak then came close to beating Craig Gordon with a shot from the edge of the box, and minutes later Daniel Kolar was on target from a similar distance only to see Gordon tip it against the crossbar. Hartley was again on hand, and cleared the rebound to safety.

The match was far more open in its opening early stages than had been expected, but Hearts were aware that such a pattern of play was more likely to lead to chances for them as well as for Sparta.

By the time the 20-minute mark had been reached, however, it was apparent that the three goals Hearts required would be, to say the least, rather hard to come by. A soft header from Pinilla was the only effort on target during that period by the visitors, who were finding it extremely difficult to get into their opponents' half in numbers. Sparta, conversely, were forcing their way up the park at will, and when one move was halted by an illegal tackle, the resultant free-kick from Simak was blocked by Gordon.

A free header at the back post by Tomas Sivok from a Kolar corner was the next and perhaps best opportunity for the home team, but he put the ball wide with Gordon apparently stranded. Brellier was then booked for a foul on Karol Kisel.

Towards the end of the half the Sparta defence was proved by no means impregnable. First a diagonal cross by Lee Wallace evaded both centre-backs and Mole got to it before the home goalkeeper, but by the time he had turned to cross the defence had regrouped. Then, after another misjudgement of a cross, this time from right to left, the ball broke to Cesnauskis, who from 20 yards should have done far better than blast over. Right on the 45-minute mark the Lithuanian winger had a clearer chance, this time when a free-kick from Hartley was headed out to him on the right edge of the box. Again, though, he was off target, low and wide.

Mole almost broke the deadlock three minutes into the second half after Pinilla steered a Hartley header into his path, but Blazek blocked well. Mikoliunas then shot wide from a Pinilla knockdown, and, as Hearts' bright start to the half continued, Libor Dosek and Repka were yellow-carded. Bednar then came on as expected, replacing Mole. The need to push men forward was by necessity leaving gaps at the back, though the introduction of Tall for Neilson to shore up the back four still seemed a waste of a substitution.

As the clock ticked down, Sparta grew more confident, sure that they were as likely to score as Hearts. Their self-belief proved not to be misplaced..

Taken from the Scotsman