5-0 loss is one of the darkest nights of my career... we owe our fans a big show to make up for it

Smith eyes revenge in West Lothian

MICHAEL SMITH insists the memory of the darkest night of his career will drive Hearts on when they return to the scene of the crime today. Livingston 5, Hearts 0. The humiliating scoreline remains etched on the defender’s brain even now, almost 12 months on from that shocking capitulation.

This afternoon they’ll be back at the Tony Macaroni Arena with a ravenous hunger, not so much to make amends – some things simply cannot be made right – but to prove that it was a one-off.

It had better be, for the sake of their festive celebrations if nothing else, because last year’s team Christmas party trip to Prague was cancelled as a consequence of that West Lothian shocker.

Smith said: “It still hurts. It’s one of our darkest days as a team and I think it was my darkest day in football.

“It was a terrible night for us. We didn’t play well at all and just collapsed. I wouldn’t say we owe them one but we’ll be remembering that scoreline when we go there.

“We owe it to ourselves to compete a lot better and we owe the fans a better performance than the last time. Hopefully they will come in their numbers and we can put on a show.

“The worst thing about it was that we collapsed and we hid. Once they scored and Arnaud Djoum was sent off and from that point it was like The Alamo.

“We just couldn’t get out and couldn’t seem to do anything about it. Maybe we should have tried to keep the score down and get out of there with a 2-0.

“We had a meeting on the bus straight after the game and said ‘there’s no way we can go on the Christmas party after that!’ It would have looked bad and we wanted to some extra training.

“It was an easy decision to make. I wouldn’t have been in the right mood to go away and have a fun weekend.

“But it happened and, although I wouldn’t say we are better for it, you remember results like that and it stands you in good stead for other performances.

“And there’s definitely no chance we’ll underestimate this game now!

“I was saying to Glenn Whelan this will be one of the toughest games he’s had in Scotland, if not the toughest. They know how to play on that surface, they’re aggressive and win second balls.

“They beat Celtic 2-0 just the other week so no one can underestimate them, and they play good football.”

Hearts’ case isn’t helped by an injury crisis that seems to keep getting worse with every passing game.

Jake Mulraney is the latest first-team regular to be crocked, taking the current casualty list to a whopping nine players.

The winger’s ankle ligament damage will see him sidelined for a month to six weeks, which suffering boss Craig Levein actually hailed as GOOD news considering the number of much lengthier lay-offs, that include star men Steven Naismith and Peter Haring.

He said: “I was elated with that. It was a bonus that it wasn’t three months because I’ve come to expect the worst, I’ve got used to it.

“Unlucky runs like this don’t go on indefinitely. It’s a really difficult period for everybody to fight their way through just now because we are down to the bare bones. But I can’t start to feel sorry for myself.”

It was a terrible night. We didn’t play well and just collapsed MICHAEL SMITH