Hearts put wind up Craigan

Patrick Glenn at Fir Park
Sunday February 24, 2008
The Observer

A match that could be considered memorable for solely negative reasons was decided by the only method that had seemed likely during 90 minutes of largely ragged and disjointed football. Motherwell defender Stephen Craigan's own goal was entirely appropriate.

If Hearts could be said ultimately to have stolen the points, they did at least deserve to be ahead for a time, having appeared more in control of difficult climatic conditions. The Tynecastle side, however, seemed to decide that no more was required of them and soon conspired in the degeneration of the overall play.

Article continues
For a team contending for third place in the championship and the Uefa Cup qualification that is the reward, Motherwell for long periods of the match gave an impressive impersonation of one fourth bottom.

The actual ninth-placed side at kick-off, of course, were Hearts, whose early lead, despite the fortunate manner in which it was taken, was the least they deserved from the pressure they had exerted and sustained through the opening dozen minutes. The visitors demonstrated a coherence from back to front and a threat in attack that made them conspicuously better than a home team seemingly unable to retain possession for more than a few seconds.

Indeed, Hearts could have been ahead as early as the third minute, when Marc Fitzpatrick completely missed the ball as he attempted to clear from the Motherwell defence and Christian Nade's powerful follow-up drive was blocked by Graeme Smith.

Soon afterwards, Nade took a neat pass from Lee Wallace on the left of the area and cut inside, but curled his right-foot chip marginally high and wide. And, when Wallace, the recipient of the final pass after an incisive one-two between Deividas Cesnauskis and Nade, finished with a wildly sliced left-foot shot, a goal for Hearts seemed inevitable.

It was, however, gained in rather unsatisfactory circumstances. In their only promising attack of the entire first half, Motherwell might have scored when Stephen Hughes' chip was headed on by David Clarkson to the advancing Keith Lasley. The midfielder, trying to take the ball in his stride, instead tripped over it.

Clarkson had clearly taken a knock to the head from José Gonçalves during the aerial challenge a moment before and lay on the turf as referee Craig Thomson allowed play to continue. Almost predictably, Hearts moved upfield and, when Eggert Jonsson hit a drive that appeared to be heading wide, Craigan stretched his left foot to deflect the ball high past his goalkeeper.

While any criticism of the general mediocrity of the match would have to include allowances for the difficult conditions, the powerful, icy wind could not excuse some of the fundamental errors, such as misplaced passes between team-mates only five yards apart.

If Motherwell seemed not to be helped by the wind at their backs before the interval, they were hardly improved by having to face it. There was a tendency among the home players simply to play the long ball into the Hearts defence in the hope of forcing an error.

In the circumstances, it was a legitimate tactic, but the home side would have been better served by more variety. Manager Mark McGhee, having been forced to replace Clarkson with Simon Lappin 18 minutes after the former's head injury, removed the struggling Hughes - his place taken by Darren Smith - early in the second half.

Unsurprisingly, however, it was from set pieces that Motherwell appeared more likely to score. Ross McCormack's free-kick from 30 yards out on the left snaked through the assembled bodies in the Hearts penalty area and would have found Steve Banks's bottom-left corner but for the goalkeeper's excellent save.

From the resulting corner, the goalkeeper lost his grip on the ball and, as it broke loose, Fitzpatrick volleyed from close range, but the ball was blocked on the line before Banks took it into his arms. The goalkeeper frustrated McCormack again from a free-kick, which proved to be Motherwell's final, futile attempt.

Taken from the Guardian/Observer