Hearts 2 Dundee United 1

By Matt McGeehan

9:51PM GMT 23 Dec 2012

John McGlynn was thrilled to see Hearts climb from ninth to sixth with a 2-1 win over Dundee United.

Despite a tumultuous recent period at Tynecastle, Hearts moved into the top half of the table, above United, as Ryan Stevenson scored twice in the first half, the second a penalty.

“The SPL is a crazy league this year,” said McGlynn, whose side next play at Kilmarnock on Boxing Day. “We’ve not been that consistent, but when you get three points it makes such a big difference. We’re delighted to get into the top six.

“We’re delighted that over the start of these four games coming up we’ve won the first. We go to Rugby Park on Wednesday, which will be difficult. It’s nice to get three points on the board and go down there with a feel-good factor and some confidence.”

Hibernian have been praised for turning from relegation candidates last term to top-six hopefuls this season, yet McGlynn’s men are only three points behind.

McGlynn hopes Hearts can overtake Hibs come the Edinburgh derby early in the New Year. “We’d like to be in that position come Jan 3,” he said.

Try as they might United could not breach Hearts’ defence for a second time after Keith Watson’s 57th-minute strike, a shot into the top of the net after a free-kick had been only half-cleared and Skacel had sliced into the ground.

“Over the piece we just deserved it,” McGlynn said. “Today we were delighted to get the early start. John Sutton was causing problems up front and that’s where the first goal came from.”

Sutton occupied the attentions of two defenders and Brian McLean’s failure to clear a ball from deep led to Stevenson simply sidefooting in.

“It gave us a great start and the penalty (after Dylan McGowan was bundled over by Willo Flood) was slotted away very well by Ryan.

“United were never really out of the game. We have got a good defensive record and that had to come out in the second half when we came under pressure.”

Dundee United manager Peter Houston was frustrated his side returned north empty-handed.

“I thought the team that played the better football lost today,” he said. “We played quite well in the first half as well and again it comes down to an individual error. The first goal Brian (McLean) should deal with, we didn’t deal with it properly and we found ourselves a goal down.

“I haven’t seen the penalty again. I thought it was a bit soft, but other people have told me it was a penalty kick.

“We found ourselves chasing the game and second half I thought we absolutely pummelled them.

“We were the away team today, but we pinned Hearts back and they were desperately hanging on. They cleared everything we threw into the box, but I’m walking away from here with nothing and I feel a wee bit hard done by. The ball didn’t break for us.”

The most popular man on the pitch was, curiously, a visiting player as Rudi Skacel returned to Tynecastle.

The Czech international’s final appearance of his second spell at Hearts was the 5-1 William Hill Scottish Cup final defeat of Hibernian on May 19 and he selected squad No 51 at United, while he was the subject of an ovation from the home faithful in the 51st minute.

His acknowledgement of the ovation appeared to anger the visiting supporters, but Houston did not wish to comment and only praised the forward’s display.

Houston said: “I thought he worked really hard and he’s been playing really well recently, and that’s why he played. It was his shot that we got the goal from. I thought he worked his socks off and nothing really broke for him today.”

Taken from telegraph.co.uk