Kurskis throws it again

ONE SHOULDN'T be surprised about anything that happens with Hearts but, despite the history of serial bampottery, they keep on causing the jaw to drop. To state that this was bizarre was to substantially under-play these strange events. A combination of an unfathomable substitution, an incomprehensible selection and a madman between the posts caused the home side to lose all three points just when it looked as though they would belatedly claim one.

Why on earth, after throwing a win away against Rangers last weekend, was slippery- fingered Eduardas Kurskis selected once more in goal? He was fortunate to stay on the field after conceding a penalty - the referee giving him the benefit of the doubt and a yellow card, judging Marius Niculae had been moving away from goal when he was pulled down. But there was no other choice when he grabbed Russell Duncan by both cheeks five minutes from the end.

It had seemed a non-contentious incident. Duncan chased down the ball, the goalkeeper shepherded it out, then the Inverness Caledonian Thistle player seemed to inadvertently trip the goalkeeper as he was collecting the ball for the goal-kick. The touch of leather on leather sent Kurskis incandescent and he grabbed the small midfielder by the face, occasioning the second yellow card followed by the red.
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It was so outlandish it also seemed an intentional ploy and his erratic display had already caused the home fans ire. It surely won't be a simple one-game ban and he might expect a plane ticket back to Vilnius on his peg on Monday.

By this stage Hearts had used up all of their substitutes and defender Lee Wallace had to pick up the discarded grey jersey and, minutes later, the ball from the net. This was, again, entirely avoidable as Calum Elliot had come on in the 33rd minute, then been replaced less than 30 minutes later just after he had played a part in Hearts' first goal.

Andrew Driver sent in a corner from the right, Christophe Berra rose to drive in a header - and claim the goal - but Elliot's leg, or perhaps a defender's, deflected the ball into the net. Before the fans were back in their seats Elliot was trotting up the tunnel.

"I'll put my hands up to that," said assistant head coach Stevie Frail, in yet another example of him taking responsibility without having the exercise of any real power. "He wasn't playing well and I thought I had to get him off. I was trying to protect him but I might have destroyed him. I'll need to have a word with him." This day was, he added, the worst that he had ever experienced in football.

Frail is a decent man in a disastrous situation. Clearly upset, he said after the game he would try to answer all the questions but confessed he didn't really know what to say. It was put to him his goalkeeper might even have wanted to be sent off, he had spilled a couple of easy shots, and the crowd had turned on him. "You'd have to ask him that," he responded, equivocal in the extreme.

It had been clear in the first few minutes that there were certain reservations, let us put it that way, about Kurskis' reappearance, a collective intake of breath by the support when the ball went near him and a marked reluctance by his back four to involve him. Marius Zaliukas, who was responsible later for a concatenation of errors, could not understand why the goalkeeper did not come out to pluck up a ball he was guarding back to him.

There was an ironic cheer after 12 minutes when a high, looping back-pass was collected by him but no one was blaming him, this time, for the goal that came less than 10 minutes later. Kurskis was left vainly spearing to his left as the shot from Russell Duncan zipped past him.

The move was started by Ian Black, who was at the centre of everything impressive about Caley Thistle. He pushed the ball out to the left flank, John Rankin cut the ball back to Roy McBain who touched for the arriving Duncan just outside the penalty box and his shot curved past the goalkeeper. A better and more confident shot-stopper might have stopped it. But that's what Hearts have been searching fruitlessly for all season, an inspirational last resort. The search continues.

Hearts' pressure in the second half was relentless but they went behind for the second time seven minutes into it from the penalty spot, after the felling of Niculae. John Rankin rammed the kick home. Duncan had played an incisive cross-field pass to the Romanian, although Zaliukas should have intercepted, and the striker was one-on-one with the calamitous keeper when he shimmied past and was brought down, perhaps softly, by an arm.

Inverness defender Rankin then tugged Andrius Velicka in the penalty box and the Hearts striker battered home the resultant penalty. This with barely three minutes left.

Kurskis by now had vacated the sticks and Hearts were vulnerable to any real attack. In injury time substitute Barry Wilson tore down the right and fired in a low cross which Zaliukas muffed, sending the ball only to a second Caley Thistle substitute, Graham Bayne, whose first-time shot tore past the stand-in.

That's five on the trot for Caley Thistle. Compare and contrast with Hearts with just one victory in nine.

Taken from the Sunday Herald