Heart of Midlothian are currently in a precarious position. The Gorgie club sit at the bottom of the Scottish Premiership table, having won just three times from their opening 17 games.
To make matters worse, Hearts failed to beat Moldovan minnows CS Petrocub in their final Europa Conference League clash on Thursday, which ensured their automatic exit from the competition.
The mood was extremely sour at Tynecastle Park. Not just come the full-time whistle but for large spells of the match.
Striker Lawrence Shankland noticed that and says he understand why supporters might not have been happy given their recent form.
But he believes the home faithful not getting fully behind the team done them no favours and potentially contributed to the fixture ending in a 2-2 draw.
“Listen, the fans are really good and I’m happy to give them credit when they are good. But I just felt like they were waiting on one mistake to turn on us and all in all it didn’t help the way the game went.
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“I’m certainly not blaming the support for what happened on the pitch. I’m just saying it didn’t help. Usually on European nights they are brilliant. They can cheer you over the line. But as I said there was a weird atmosphere and I know the league form isn’t helping with things. We are looking to improve that. It was a difficult night all round.
“All the boys are feeling it. Obviously there’s that bit of responsibility [on me] to try and keep people’s heads up. At times on Thursday I thought we showed good character to keep trying to do what we were trying to do.
“But every time the ball went backwards there was boos. It’s not easy to take the ball and do that when you are wanting to make the right decisions. It’s difficult for boys out there.”
Hearts host St Johnstone on Sunday and Shankland was quizzed on whether he hopes the hostile environment disappears come kick-off.
"I’m not asking the fans to do anything," he stated. “They can turn up and do whatever they want, they pay their money for tickets and expect us to win games. I totally understand that.
"Right now we are not doing that so I understand the criticism. But it was very early on against Petrocub that it got hostile.
“It’s a missed opportunity. Without doubt. Qualification was there for us after the start we had. But it wasn’t to be. It’s a sore one. The objective was to win the game and get through and we’ve not managed to do that.
“We’re missing that final bit of quality to create that chance. We’re probably counting half chances as chances just now. I don’t remember the goalie making a good save apart from dealing with crosses. That’s what we need to work on - making the goalkeeper work and keeping him busy.”
