Monday, August 06, 2007

Hope springs eternal

I've just finished watching Hibs beat my team, Hearts 1-0 in the first Edinburgh derby of the season, but oddly I feel more positive about Hearts than I have for some time (which isn't saying a great deal, but you have to start somewhere).

Given that we were missing half a team inlcuding our captain, vice-captain and midfield playmaker, had several players making their debuts and effectively played with a passenger up front, we played the vast majority of the actual football on show. Meanwhile Hibs - the so-called flair team - spent the entire first half booting the ball up the pitch and getting their cumbersome and skill-free new forward, Clayton Donaldson, to lumber towards it like a particularly ungainly sloth.

Hibs were, in truth, a poorer team than I expected, albeit one enlivened in the second half by some flashes from Benji, their Moroccan striker, but otherwise toothless and lacking in ideas. Hearts it has to be said, were equally lacking in inspiration, but at least we were always moving the ball on the ground, and trying to play the game in a way Hibs' fans and the Scottish press like to think the Hobos have a monopoly on. We may have failed to score, but we had some twenty shots compared to Hibs two, which provides a more realistic measure of who had all the pressure.

And let's have no more talk of diving Hearts players following Rob Jones - all 6 foot four of blady serial killer of him - throwing himself to the ground, feigning a foul, to prevent Hearts' five foot nothing midfielder, Ksanavicius - the Man of the Match in any neutral's eyes (so obviously not in those of fervent anti-jambo Steve Lovell, then) from scoring a certain equaliser.

One final thing - how refreshing was it to see a Hearts manager take off two players who were playing rubbish, even thought they were Lithuanian? If the gormless Miko and clueless Beniusus had been hooked earlier we might even have won, but still - little steps to start with. Anyway, a Hearts manager subbing Romanov's red-cheeked love child Miko is usually a precursor to a P45 so it was a pleasure to see our new coaching team arewilling to risk that for the team.

Hi Dave, do you like the review? ;-)

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1 Comments:

Blogger Scott Liddell said...

Methinks you may have fallen off your camel...

9:43 am  

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