Hosts show muscle amid the bustle

ABERDEEN SIGNALLED THEIR INTENT TO REASSERT themselves as the Clydesdale Bank Premier League's third force with a forceful performance in a thrilling but often ugly game in which a ragged Hearts side were left depleted by the ordering off of Marius Zaliukas 20 minutes from the end and had full-back Lee Wallace red-carded following a clash outside the Pittodrie dressing rooms.

Lee Miller's glorious first-half strike to seal the victory, and move Aberdeen to within a point of the Tynecastle men, was not the only difference between the sides. The home team gave their sometimes pernickety fans - it was Aberdeen's biggest crowd of the season - plenty to cheer about with a pulsating performance that had them on the edge of their seats for every absorbing minute of the game.

The nine bookings, two of which - for Aberdeen's Chris Maguire and Robbie Neilson of Hearts - came as the teams were leaving the pitch at the end, highlighted the physical nature of this encounter, a factor which became apparent after only 15 seconds of play when Charlie Mulgrew was on the receiving end of a thudding challenge from Christian Nade, the Tynecastle striker, and was forced to retire injured.
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Last night Csaba Laszlo, the Hearts manager, revealed that referee Ian Brines entered his side's dressing room at the end to red-card Wallace, a move which disappointed him.

"The referee came into our dressing room at the end," he said, "and had a conversation with Lee Wallace and showed him a red card. Before that, Robbie Neilson told me that, as he was going towards the tunnel at the end, someone kicked him from behind and he turned round and reacted and he was yellow carded."

It was in that incident that Maguire, too, was shown a yellow card.

"I am sorry for Wallace and what happened at the end," Laszlo added. "After a game like this you have so many emotions and I didn't think it was necessary for the referee to enter the dressing room.

"I will not punish the players who were red-carded. They are human beings and football is an emotional game."

Jimmy Calderwood, the Aberdeen manager, was angry at Zaliukas's attempt to persuade the referee to book Darren Mackie just before the break following a collision, but praised Brines for his action.

"I've had problems with Ian Brines before," he said, "but I thought he handled the game very well and when people ask him to hand out yellow cards, which has nothing to do with Scottish football, he did well in showing a yellow card to Zaliukas for that."

Calderwood stressed the importance of the win over one of Aberdeen's principal rivals for a place in European football and praised the training ground move which brought the game's only goal.

He added: "We hadn't beaten any of the top six teams this season and Hearts are on a wonderful run.

"Lee Miller's goal came from practice on the training ground and was a goal fit to win any game."

If Calderwood's early thoughts were on the enforced change to his line-up after Mulgrew's departure, his woes could have been lifted in the 10th minute as Darren Mackie raced on to Jeffrey de Visscher's clever head flick into his path. Janos Balogh blocked the Aberdeen striker's shot bravely, however, and he stopped a powerful 18-yard strike from the same player five minutes later.

Play swung from end to end, but Aberdeen's shooting looked the more threatening. A de Visscher volley sizzled past the post while Balogh was once more pressed into action to save Gary McDonald's ferocious drive.

The Hearts goalkeeper was given plenty of warning of Aberdeen's intentions but he still seemed shocked when they scored in the 37th minute, Lee Miller firing home an angled volley from Scott Severin's free kick from the other side of the pitch.

Aberdeen's determination to hold on to that lead was apparent after the restart. Hearts lacked invention, although the same charge might have been levelled at Sone Aluko, so often a talismanic figure for Calderwood's side, but seen only sporadically here. The game boiled over three minutes later during a skirmish on Langfield's goal-line as Stewart lined up to take a corner from the left.

As Brines stepped in there were indications that Zaliukas, booked in the first half, had used an elbow on Considine and he was therefore ordered off. Miller and Nade were shown yellow for their part in the drama.

Such shenanigans, not to mention those that followed at the end, underscored the intensity of this game. It was the Pittodrie side who grabbed it by the scruff of the neck and emerged victorious.

Taken from the Herald