STEEPED LEARNING CURVE
Jack: Bonding sessions are teaching us what it means to wear jersey
JACK HAMILTON is convinced double training sessions and dinner with his team-mates can help put Europa League football back on the menu at Tynecastle.
Hamilton revealed Hearts have been involved in bonding sessions over the past 10 days in a bid to arrest their recent slide. The Gorgie side have not won in their last five domestic matches, including a humiliating 3-1 loss to Hibs at Easter Road in the Scottish Cup fifth-round replay last month. The defeat by their city rivals led to fierce criticism of the Jambos players amid claims Ian Cathro’s foreign stars did not fully understand what it meant to wear the maroon shirt. And Hamilton, 22, admits the Hearts squad have been addressing that issue during their extended lay-off. The Jambos keeper said: “A lot of boys know now what it means to wear the jersey. “It was drilled into everybody and by the end of it everybody knew how big a club Hearts actually are. “For me, playing in the derby does mean a lot. Even going out in Edinburgh after the derby – it means so much to the people. “We were poor on the night but we need to repay the fans now. “The criticism stings but everybody’s entitled to their opinions and we need to put that right on the park. There is no point moping about it – we need to go out and prove ourselves.
“We’ve been training hard and doing some team bonding.
“We have a good dressing room and everybody has each other’s back. We’ve watched highlights from games in the past – the passion of the derby – and tried to drill that into them.
“The double sessions have meant longer days and that has been lifting everybody.
“If you’re doing the extra training, everybody doesn’t mind putting the effort in and trying to get back to where we were.
“We’ve been out and had dinner a few times. It’s good for
the boys coming from abroad with their partners, they’ve maybe not got much to do outwith the football.
“It has been difficult but you’re at a massive club with massive expectations. We have to realise that as well. We just have to go out in every game and try to build on it, get ourselves better and get results for the team.
“We still want to finish as high in the table as we can. A European place is a must really, we can’t be settling for anything less.
“Hearts need the European place. That would be a brilliant achievement. We want to progress and improve every season as individuals and a club.”
The shot-stopper will take his usual place between the sticks for the visit of second-bottom
Hamilton today. He admitted the Jambos players are desperate to make amends to the supporters who jeered Cathro and the team after their shock 1-0 loss to Ross County 10 days ago.
But Hamilton also revealed the players are firmly behind Cathro despite the fact the rookie boss has won just four out of 15 games.
Hamilton added: “He’s the man in charge, all the players have his back. The manager has been brilliant since he came in. It’s time for us to repay him and get positive results.
“We just want games to get back winning again. Hopefully we can put in the right performances and get a result.
“The supporters have been great. We can’t say, ‘The fans need to get behind us’ because we haven’t given them the results.
“It is down to us to get a result for them. They are paying good money to come and watch so we need to perform for them as well as ourselves.”