Hearts striding towards third, says Naismith
HEARTS boss Steven Naismith is confident his team have now all but wrapped up third place after they claimed a point against nearest rivals Kilmarnock.
Killie are the only team who could conceivably catch Hearts in the race for third. But, realistically, this was a game they needed to win to prolong those ambitions.
While it’s not quite mathematically a done deal, Killie now need to win their final four games and hope that Hearts lose all of theirs.
The teams fought out a frustrating goalless stalemate, but this was a day when Hearts effectively wrapped up third spot and the guarantee of group-stage European football next season.
There is also a £5million Euro windfall that comes with it — and Naismith acknowledged that it is now nigh-on impossible for his side to be caught.
After watching his team dominate at Rugby Park, twice hitting the woodwork, the Hearts boss said: ‘We should have had it won in the first half. Our performance today was brilliant.
‘The only thing we missed was probably a few goals. We did everything but score. And that’s taking into account who we are playing. This is one of the toughest places to come.
‘Today has been a big step in getting us over the line because we have asked Kilmarnock to not drop a point until the end of the season against the best teams in the league.’
Hearts were looking to bounce back from the disappointment of last weekend’s defeat to Rangers in the Scottish Cup semi-final.
They never really fired a shot at Hampden in what was a lacklustre performance. But they looked far brighter yesterday.
On 23 minutes, Kenneth Vargas almost opened the scoring after a neat exchange of passes with
Lawrence Shankland. Vargas thumped a left-foot shot towards goal, but the ball came crashing back off the underside of the bar.
After Will Dennis had made a good save low at the feet of Jorge Grant, the ball broke out to Cammy Devlin on the edge of the box in the next phase of play.
Australian midfielder Devlin curled a peach of a shot towards the top corner, but, again, the ball came back off the bar.
Killie were being overrun and swamped in midfield, with Devlin, Grant, and Beni Baningime running the show for the visitors. Baningime, in particular, was an impressive figure in the middle of the park. But his involvement was cut short when he was forced off due to injury just before half-time.
It wasn’t a bad game by any means, but it needed a goal. Killie skipper Kyle Vassell stung Zander Clark’s hands on 68 minutes with a long-range effort, but clear-cut chances were scarce.
Killie almost won it right at the death when Marley Watkins latched on to Kevin van Veen’s cutback, but his shot was clawed away by Clark when it looked destined for the top corner.
Admitting that his side were largely second best, McInnes said: ‘I think there were reasons for not being at our best today. But you need to compliment Hearts. They were good.
‘But we showed our desire to be competitive and grind out a point.’