Skipper Lawrence Shankland believes Hearts can recover in the battle for Europe having already staged one huge comeback in a see-saw season.
The Tynecastle side are five points adrift of third-placed Aberdeen as they look to nab a spot in the qualifiers for the Europa League and, if Celtic win the Scottish Cup, seal continental football until Christmas at least. Interim boss Steven Naismith says the next two games against St Mirren and the Dons will define the campaign.
Shankland insists past experience tells him the goal is still achievable as he admits losing out would feel like a chance missed. “Probably, aye, because of the situation we were in,” said the Scotland striker. But Shankland then added: “What I will say is that before the World Cup we were eight points behind. It has been kind of up and down. When we have finished all the fixtures, if we have not finished third, then we have not been good enough for the full season.
“It will not come down to a certain point or a certain game. We will look at the whole season. We are still hopeful, we believe in what we are doing and we have got important games coming up.
“Listen, we had a wee bad run and it cost us our position there. That is all it takes. It can happen quite quickly. Our performances have been decent in the last couple of games. We can build on that. We just need to concentrate on our performances and trying to get wins.”
Hearts were unable to make up ground on when losing 2-0 to champions Celtic on Sunday. Alex Cochrane’s VAR-instigated red card was a huge talking point after the game and Shankland said: “I was surprised it got checked initially. But I thought the referee would maybe have checked it and stuck with his decision.
“When he gave him the yellow card, I thought it was dealt with. When I went to speak to the referee, he said there was no defender there covering.
“I took his word for it at the time. There hasn’t been much clarity in terms of those things and that is why there have been hiccups during the season.”
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