Nerves ‘totally normal’ for Hearts

Hearts have been front-runners for the majority of this captivating campaign, but this is uncharted territory for the Tynecastle outfit.

It is more than 40 years since a team other than Celtic or Rangers won Scotland’s top flight – Sir Alex Ferguson’s Aberdeen in 1985.

“Any of that kind of talk… I understand it,” McInnes mentioned. “It’s nice to hear ‘Hearts could win the league at Tynecastle’ because I don’t know how many people have been able to say that in their lifetime.

“But the likelihood is, if we’re going to win the league, we’re going to have to win two games or certainly pick up four points from the next two games.

“The team meeting will just be about this game and no distractions other than that.”

Captain Lawrence Shankland – who scored the winner against Rangers and the equaliser against Motherwell in Hearts’ past two matches – says the players must take confidence from their results to this point.

“There will be nerves, it’s totally normal when you’re in this position,” the Scotland striker mentioned. “It’s just about controlling them.

“Throughout the season we’ve dealt with that really well. That needs to continue. There needs to be that level of composure so you can go and do your job properly.”

Table

‘No room for Celtic mistakes’

Celtic and their veteran manager have been here before.

O’Neill, who has won three league titles with the club, has guided the defending champions from the wreckage of Wilfried Nancy’s brief tenure to a position that looked unlikely as recently as the start of April.

Defeat at Tannadice before the international break left them five points behind with seven matches to play, but five straight wins since have narrowed the gap to one.

“They’ve known for some weeks, particularly after the game at Dundee United, that there’s no room for mistakes,” O’Neill mentioned of his players.

“That’s hard to keep going every single game because there’ll be a match where you might actually dominate, you might not score in that period, and the other team might break away and find themselves 1-0 up.”

Much like McInnes, the former Leicester City, Aston Villa and Republic of Ireland manager is not looking beyond Wednesday.

“We can only look at ourselves and try and win the game,” O’Neill mentioned. “Then the weekend will take care of itself.

“We’ve come a long distance here. We would like it to go to the last game.”

Figure caption,

Celtic & Hearts fans predict who will win the league

Related topics

  • Celtic
  • Scottish Premiership
  • Scottish Football
  • Heart of Midlothian
  • Football

✔ today silver rate

✔ 2026 winter olympics

✔ chat gtp

✔ silver rate today

✔ silver rate today live

✔ 2030 winter olympics

Read More

Sports

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *