MATCH FITNESS A BIG STRUGGLE — NEILSON

HEARTS head coach Robbie Neilson admits his side’s lack of competitive fitness was a factor as they narrowly beat Infonet 2-1 in the Europa League.

The Jambos take a lead to Estonia for Wednesday’s first qualifying-round second l eg after coming from behind to beat the Tallinn club, who are already 17 games into their domestic campaign.

The visitors went ahead in the 21st minute with a s t u n n i n g vo l l ey from Jegveni Harin but Hearts levelled through Prince Buaben from the penalty spot seven minutes later.

Infonet captain Andrei Kalimullin then scored an own goal 10 minutes before the break after Jamie Walker’s corner caused panic.

Neilson, whose side were playing in their first competitive game of the campaign, admits his team struggled t o get up t o match speed.

He said: “The fitness aspect made it twice as hard. We looked rusty in the first half an hour.

“These games are always difficult. When we saw them, we looked at the CVs — they’re a good team, guys with 100 caps.

“They have good players who have played at decent levels so we knew it would be tough. We’ve got a lot of guys who haven’t played any European football.

“My concern was it was really open at the start. Then both teams started to shut down towards the end of the game and they were probably happy with 2-1.”