Cup fates are conspiring against hapless Hearts

Glenn Gibbons
IN THREE Scottish Cup campaigns since they won the trophy in 2006, Hearts have failed to reach even as far as the quarterfinals. It may be about 100 years too soon to be talking of a curse of Hibernian proportions, but the manner of this latest elimination by Falkirk suggests that there is something in the air.
It may, of course, be merely a slightly protracted victimisation by Sod's Law, that unwritten statute which plays havoc with the emotions and induces bafflement in those who come under its damning influence. The year after their triumph over Gretna, for example, Hearts were put out by a 90th-minute goal by Dunfermline, at a time in the season when the Tynecastle side were fourth in the Premier League and the Fifers were bottom and would go on to be relegated.

Last season, they capitulated to Motherwell, having led 2-0 at home in their fourth-round tie before drawing 2-2 and losing 1-0 in the replay. Added to what occurred in the defeat by Falkirk, these are events that tend to indicate a growing sourness in their relationship with the old pot.

A large majority of the 13,000 or so Hearts fans in the crowd will undoubtedly direct the blame for their frustration at the referee, Dougie McDonald, but this would be unreasonable. In the matter of arbitrating the three most significant incidents of the match – Falkirk's winning goal, the ordering-off of Marius Zaliukas and change of mind over Hearts' second-half penalty kick – anyone taking a detached view would find it difficult to find the referee culpable.

The termination of Hearts' interest in the Homecoming Scottish Cup for another year was more attributable to their own failure to exploit their general superiority and to convert the opportunities they created in the course of an eventful 90 minutes.

Csaba Laszlo, the Tynecastle manager, was among those who considered Steve Lovell's goal – scored at a time when Falkirk appeared to be retreating ever more deeply into defence, perhaps sensing that a replay would be their best hope – was offside. "I don't like to talk about referee's decisions," said Laszlo, clear notice that he was just about to. "But the goal, it could not have been more offside."

Lovell was certainly isolated when Jackie McNamara lofted the ball into the home penalty area, his header floating over goalkeeper Janos Balogh and hitting the underside of the bar. The Falkirk fans behind the goal could see that the ball had crossed the line and had already risen in acclaim when substitute Carl Finnigan ran forward to knock the ball into the net.

It is easy to sympathise with Laszlo's view, as only the television cameras, or those fans in the vicinity with precisely the same view as linesman Martin Cryans, could possibly have seen that David Obua, loitering in the left-back position as the rest of his team-mates rushed out of the penalty area, had played Lovell onside.

As for the Zaliukas dismissal, there is no room for debate. It was the hearts defender who committed the foul as he came across to barge Finnigan. As the Falkirk forward toppled, his arm round Zaliukas's neck, he wrestled the defender to the ground. It was then, however, that the Hearts player tried twice to punch and then kick Finnigan. In flourishing the red card, referee McDonald indicated the reason for it with a punching gesture. It was Zaliukas's third ordering-off of the season and the team's eighth, the kind of record that has already brought fines from the SFA three times for their indiscipline.

McDonald had an equally uncomplicated decision over the stoppage-time dismissal of Falkirk's Scott Arfield, the result of two straight-forward yellow cards.

Curiously, the loss of Zaliukas made little difference to Hearts' prospects of retrieving at least a replay. As Falkirk protected their advantage, the home side were not subjected to much pressure in defence, although Michael Higdon had a strike disallowed for offside, itself a very tight call.

But Hearts appeared to have won the best chance of all to equalise when McDonald pointed to the penalty spot after Dean Holden had challenged Andrew Driver as the latter surged into the penalty area near the dead-ball line on the right.

From the pressbox, it appeared an unjust decision, as Holden had clearly snaked out his long left leg and knocked the ball away for a corner kick. The far-side linesman, Chris Young, obviously came to the same conclusion, as he persuaded McDonald to change his decision to a corner. Television, however, suggested the referee may have been correct originally, as Holden appeared to take Driver's left leg away from him before he made contact with the ball.

It was the kind of inconclusive evidence that will ensure an irresolvable debate and which makes it impossible to find guilt in any of the involved parties. For Hearts, though, it would feel like confirmation that their departure from the competition was somehow pre-destined.

That feeling would have started to take root the moment, early in the game, when Gary Glen, taking a cut-back from Lee Wallace on the left, sent his low shot wide of Dani Mallo's right-hand post, an opportunity he should have converted. The teenage striker would have a similar chance soon after, this time from Robbie Neilson's cut-back from the right.

On this occasion, however, Glen's rising drive, although on target, was too close to Mallo, allowing the goalkeeper to leap and touch the ball over the bar. These incidents, and Hearts' general ineffectiveness in their opponents' area, simply amounted to vindication of the pre-match suspicion that, with a makeshift strike partnership of the novice Glen and Eggert Jonsson, normally a defender/midfielder, goals could prove elusive.

Taken from the Scotsman