Speculation continues over who will be the next manager at Hearts and BBC Sport Scotland report that the Jambos will make an official approach to Kilmarnock on Monday.

Derek McInnes is said to be the man they want but the former Aberdeen boss would not be drawn on reports linking him to the job after Kilmarnock secured their place in the William Hill Premiership next season with a 3-2 success over Dundee at Rugby Park on Saturday, their third straight victory.

McInness said there there had been no contact between the clubs, however, the 53-year-old former Aberdeen boss is heavily tipped to take over from Neil Critchley.

Liam Fox (pictured) was in Hearts’ dugout on Saturday as the Men in Maroon beat Motherwell 3-0 thanks to a double from Lawrence Shankland and a single from Alan Forrest to move into seventh spot in the table.

Shankland has now scored five goals in three games and the interim manager stressed that the Scotland international will score goals if given the right service.

Fox added that the victory over the Fir Park side was a team effort and his players deserved huge credit for the way they have performed at Ross County and on Saturday.

He added: “It has been a disappointing season, we know that, we accept that, but we are really pleased with the last two results and are looking forward to Wednesday.” Hearts are at home to St Johnstone (kick-off 19.45) before travelling to Kilmarnock for their final league game on Saturday.

Hearts go into the midweek have scored six goals in their last two outings and only let in one. Shankland broke the deadlock at sun-kissed Tynecastle against The Steelmen with a low shot from the edge of the box after 30 minutes.

Motherwell skipper Stephen O’Donnell was caught out by the bounce of a clearance from debutant goalkeeper Ryan Fulton.

Shankland moved to his right and then sent the ball back the other way and it nestled in the back of the Motherwell net to spark celebrations around Tynecastle.

Then James Penrice sent an inch-perfect cross into the box and Shankland was there to send the ball home with a well-directed header. Time 60 minutes.

Two minutes later, it was Forrest who netted to end the contest. Second-half substitute, Yan Dhanda, who has been frozen out of the starting line-up of late, picked up the ball on the left side of the pitch.

He cut in and fired a dipping shot which Motherwell goalkeeper Aston Oxborough spilled and busy Forrest made no mistake from an angle, burying the ball into the bottom left hand corner of the net.

The Fir Park side thought they had levelled near half-time when Callum Slattery shot home, but the celebrations were cut short when VAR intervened.

It took nearly four minutes for the decision to come through and defender Dan Casey was adjudged to have jumped into Fulton’s line of sight from an offside position.

Motherwell manager Michael Wimmer said his men were not good enough at either end of the pitch.

He added: “It was a disappointing result and this happens. There were four shoots for Hearts and they score three goals and we did not score so it was no good enough in both boxes. It was too easy.

“There are no excuses, today we were not good enough.”

image_pdfimage_print
Website |  + posts

Experienced news, business, arts, sport and travel journalist. Food critic and managing editor of a well-established food and travel website. Also a magazine editor of publications with circulations of up to 200,000 and managing director of a long-established PR/marketing company with a string of blue-chip clients in its CV. Former communications lecturer at a Scottish university and social media specialist for a string of successful and busy SMEs.

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.