Motherwell 3 - 1 Hearts: Hearts are 'Well beaten

Published Date: 14 March 2010
By Gary Sutherland at Fir Park
Reynolds 2; Sutton 13; O'Brien 68

Templeton 70
CRAIG Brown's Motherwell remain unbeaten in the league this year, their last SPL defeat coming at the hands of Hearts at the tail end of 2009.

Motherwell got their noses in front here early on yesterday, scenting victory for the remainder of a game that was well within their control. Hearts let themselves down badly at the start with some shambolic defending from which they failed to recover, though they had a better second half.

"We started the first half exceptionally well," said Brown. "But you know Jim Jefferies' teams will always battle. We had to dig out the second half, but we were comfortably ahead at half time. It's a really young team and it's a delight to work with these guys every day. We've consolidated our chances of finishing fifth and that's a great achievement from the objective we were given."

That's 12 league games unbeaten for Motherwell. "Twelve unbeaten is quite good," said their manager with some understatement.

Motherwell didn't waste any time, winning a first-minute corner and getting a goal out of it, with Hearts caught napping. Tom Hateley played it short, Jim O'Brien dinked a neat chip into a busy goalmouth and Mark Reynolds rose to head the ball into the net from close range.

With the visitors nodding off, Motherwell were off to a flyer. The home side had a platform to build on and didn't wait long to extend their lead, John Sutton meeting Keith Lasley's low centre and tucking the ball over the line, the Hearts marking again absent.

"The first 20 minutes was just disgraceful to be honest – the defending," said Jefferies. "We gave away a corner and slept. We've not contested the cross. People that were supposed to be picking up didn't do their job right. The second goal was worse. It was real schoolboy stuff and there were a few choice words at half time. We showed a bit of improvement in the second half."

With quarter of an hour gone, Sutton almost made it 3-0, his excellent header flashing just wide of the post. What a start this was for Motherwell, though Hearts clearly weren't at the game. Their defence in particular appeared to have taken the weekend off.

Eventually, Hearts did turn up. The second part of the first half was much better from them. They saw more of the ball on their terms. They spent more time in the Motherwell half. They knew a goal would get them back into this game and that there was time. They just couldn't afford any more dreadful lapses at the back.

When Motherwell threatened now, Hearts got the vital blocks in, allowing them the chance to respond. Had they done this at the outset, they might not have found themselves in such an awkward predicament. The other thing with this Hearts side though was that whenever they did push forward they never looked like scoring. Motherwell looked more likely to score again.

The second half offered Hearts a fresh start, though they were largely restricted to long-range efforts that either flew over or trundled wide. What they had, at least, was some semblance of dominance, albeit a dominance that lacked a cutting edge.

Motherwell broke and lodged the ball in the back of the Hearts net again, but this time it was offside. The next time it wasn't. Jamie Murphy crossed from the left, Lukas Jutkiewicz missed the header and O'Brien latched onto it at the far side of the box. The angle was tight, the Hearts backline tried to gather, but O'Brien had one thing on his mind and wasted no time in smashing a fine shot into the net. "He's been a very exciting player," said his manager, "and his goal was a terrific strike."

Hearts scored a minute later, a minute too late. David Templeton found the target for the visitors, accepting a low ball and turning neatly to net, but instead of 2-1 it was 3-1 and only 20 minutes remained. Sutton was presented with a great chance of netting Motherwell's fourth, but blazed over the crossbar.

As the match entered stoppage time, O'Brien left the field to generous applause from the Motherwell fans who had been treated to another fine individual display that had done their team a great deal of good. But overall Motherwell were better. "They were quicker, sharper, their application was better," said Jefferies. Motherwell were three points better off too.

MAN OF THE MATCH

You wonder what kind of game Jim O'Brien would have had, had he been playing on grass. After teeing up the first goal, O'Brien was spraying passes all over the pitch before scoring a fine goal himself.

QUICK FACT

Craig Brown's side are now 12 games unbeaten in the league, a superb sequence.

TALKING POINT

Not taking anything away from another excellent Motherwell performance, but Hearts' defending ... this game was won and lost in the first 20 minutes. You just can't afford to get off to a bad start against this Motherwell team.

Taken from the Scotsman