Martin_T

Very unlikely, but given Aberdeen's precipitous form and the fact Derek McInnes Kilmarnock currently sit 2nd in the Championship, there's a prospect of McInnes rolling into Pittodrie to relegate the Dons.

Killie seem to have chucked a lot of money at it recently. Dire consequences if they don't get up this season?

My main concern ahead of the game is that our defence is likely to made up of players that have hardly played together, especially if Souttar leaves and with Halkett and Smith out injured. We're probably looking at a back 3 of Moore, Sibbick and Kingsley. They did ok in the 2nd half against Motherwell, but it's probably a weak point. Our midfield and attacking options by contrast are very strong, hoping that we get a 90 minute performance and a 2-0 win.

Our average is around 17,000 so most likely.

Especially given the incredibly self absorbed notion, that if the allocation is reduced, the rest of the stadium must sell out to justify it. Hearts do not rely in the slightest, on the income of Glasgow away fans to run the club sustainably and are completely within our rights to continue to limit the numbers, which I sincerely hope that we do.

The first half was arguably as one sided as our game vs Talbot on Saturday. But then for all the players Celtic had out injured, they still had multi millions worth of talent in the starting XI and their wage budget is 7x that of Hearts, it's actually a credit to Scottish football that these games are anywhere near competitive. 2nd half was much better, albeit with somewhat crude tactics, big man (Simms) up top, 4-4-2 and launch it to bypass the press. If the penalty had gone in, who knows what the final score may have been? Re the Crowd, it was 17,967, our last home game vs Celtic with the stadium fully open was on 18/12/2019 and with Celtic fans having the full Roseburn, the Crowd was 17,297 (https://www.londonhearts.com/scores/games/201912181.html). So far more Hearts fans in the stadium and a larger overall attendance. I'm keen that the club continues to restrict the Glasgow clubs allocations, indeed I would encourage them to explore ways to cut it further.

There will still be a crowd in excess of 18,000 at the game, £30,000 makes very little material impact on Hearts finances and I suspect that by kick off time tomorrow, there will perhaps only be a few hundred at most unsold anyway. Quite simply we don't need a full away end to run the club sustainably, and most our fans back the cutting of the Glasgow clubs allocations unequivocally.

Exactly. Personally I think that giving them the full stand gives them a footballing advantage as well. Fully onboard with the cut in allocation and hopefully it's permanent, regardless of whether we sell out the home end.

I recall reading that that is through choice, he had offers but chose not to take any.

Very nearly Jim Jefferies in 98/99. We won the cup and put in a strong challenge for the title in 97/98, finishing within 7 points of 1st placed Celtic, following a frustrating run of draws at home in March/ April of that season. The next season we were bottom of the league in March, we were really struggling to score goals, had gone out of the Scottish Cup at the first hurdle away to Motherwell. It was only the return from injury of Colin Cameron and the signing of Darren Jackson that turned it around.

Probably earned on the basis of a superb touch he had versus Hearts on Tuesday, trapped a high ball on a sixpence.

There was a run of games where we seemed to lose 0-2 at home every week despite creating a load of chances. If it wasn't for the signing of Darren Jackson and the return of Cameron, we could well have gone down that season.

Yes I think there was a great deal more dynamism in general. Would like to see Ginnelly get a run in the team in that role.

Seen a few comments along these lines. Woodburn was playing wide left, Ginnelly played at centre forward in place of Boyce. See Hearts Twitter feed for comments from Ginnelly on asking Boyce for advice on how to play as a centre forward before the game.

Tough game for Hearts, best I can see is a draw. In many ways the run of games Aberdeen are currently in was probably better for them, as tougher opponents serves to focus the players minds a bit. Much like the 2019/20 Hearts side, it seemed to be a constant stream of calamitous individual errors that were costing the Dons games this season, rather than poor team performances per se.

Lee McCulloch.

Missed the weekend with injury. Looking at the Scotland squad, there is no one I think that he would obviously be ahead of, even though he's had a strong start to the season.

Mark Robins in 1990 against Nottingham Forest in the FA Cup 3rd Round. It was widely expected that Sir Alex would have been sacked if they had lost that game.

Wincels?

Aberdeen at home is curiously, probably the fixture I'm most confident about winning, possibly because Hearts rarely fail to turn up in this fixture.

Feeling weirdly confident about this, probably lulled into a false sense of security by Celtic's recent poor form. I think if we play on the front foot, Ginnelly, Boyce and GMS can certainly expose what looks to be a particularly weak Celtic defence.

Haven't Hibs spent most of their existence embracing Leith as part of their identity? Why is Edinburgh now such a big part of their marketing?

There is no chance that Jordan Roberts is on £7k a week.

Correct, if every club was locked in to a strict 50% of turnover on the playing budget, Hearts would still have a huge budgetary advantage over any of our league opponents last season. But that is not 'splashing the cash', it's a club bigger than it's opponents finding itself in a league below it's stature due to previous incompetence. Anyway a bit off topic for the Kilmarnock thread.

Hearts income is far bigger than all those clubs, so what exactly is your point? Should we have adjusted our budget to the average for the Championship?