Aim Here

Seems my prayers were answered. I don't think I've any right to complain about Hibs for the rest of the year.

Livingston reckon they don't need seven substitutes or a striker to get a result against us, it seems. I suspect they're right.

Bartley took a shot at goal? And nearly scored? What have you guys done with the real Marvin Bartley?

I know that winning a game is out of the question, but could we at least be the team that scores the late equalizer now and again? Is that too much to ask?

Same as for the home end. £23 for an adult, £14 concessions.

Kamberi starts and Doidge doesn't even make the bench. I'm assuming this is due to a DIY accident or a dodgy curry rather than him finally going out of favour with Hecky...

Scorched retinas, or actually being able to see Leveinball being played on plastic at the Spaghettihad. Tough choice.

To be fair, Horgan was the guy who put in the (superbly well-executed) miss on Saturday. Doidge actually contrived to get the ball in the net, for a change. Doidge starting and Kamberi not starting does seem like a certainty, sadly.

Oh my. A day out in a shopping centre car park in darkest Lanarkshire, watching twenty-two cloggers duke it out on a nasty pitch while contending for SPFL mediocrity of the year. Hibs are slightly ahead in the enthusiasm stakes, having somehow narrowly failed to lose three games in a row now, the highpoint of the season so far. Scotty Allan and Paul Heckingbottom are understandably sitting this one out, as are any Hibees who have any sense (the population of Hamilton sitting it out is a given). The Met Office is forecasting a grey, dismal day interspersed with light rain around kickoff, in keeping with the tone of the event. I fully expect turgid, unwatchable football, a poor result that satisfies neither team, and for everyone to have blanked this game from their memories by 5:30 on Saturday afternoon. I can't fucking wait, meself.

Clearly. It's not raining in Edinburgh at the moment.

Alexei Leonov is wandering the heavens, again.

Not if they have even better players on the books. Even the diddiest EPL team - and Bournemouth is close to being that - can afford to pay someone like Jermain Defoe footballer wages to sit on his arse in the pub playing dominoes every Saturday afternoon, if they have a mind to. Being the third or fourth best striker in an EPL team still means you're a very, very good striker indeed.

Counting goals per game really is misleading, precisely because coming off the bench and playing 3 minutes of extra time counts the same as playing a full 90 minute game. He scored roughly 1 league goal every 270 minutes on the pitch, which is about average for a striker, and he did that in one of the poorer teams in a hyper-competitive league.

Ntcham was fouled by Vela; that's presumably why Vela was also booked immediately after this particular altercation.

Is there a way we can throw in the towel and take the 0-3 forfeit without the SPFL calling shenanigans?

It's Marciano who's been in goals for our highest-scoring losses this season, so Maxwell hasn't been 'keeping Marciano out of the team' or 'having a nightmare start to the season', really.

It's likely he'll be seeing out his days in a white room, then?

Song singular. If the last hour is anything to go by, the only song, sectarian or otherwise, that the Jambos that are hanging around Middletons seem to know is the Gorgie Billy boys.

Possibly, but who out of our current roster would give us more dig in midfield than Vela and Hallberg? That's not a team selection issue, it's a recruitment issue.

Amused as I am to hear this, the statement has been out for significantly less than an hour. How many Heart of Midlothian season ticket holders would have managed to read it already, let alone get their direct debits cancelled, and how are you able to survey them all so fast?

How sure are we that this supposed managerial appointment isn't Craig Levein's standard pre-derby mindgames? At this stage in the buildup, we should be due a backpage story reporting rumours of the 'Naismith's taken a bad knock in training, Berra was crushed by a falling grand piano on Slateford Road and Souttar is pregnant and has taken six months maternity leave' variety - only to see all three taking pride of place in the starting lineup. So far, nothing. My guess is that in the current febrile climate, Levein has reckoned that it's more plausible for him to have sacked and replaced himself before he was pushed than it is for the players to catch bubonic plague immediately before a Hibs game yet again, and has leaked the rumours appropriately...

Who's going to drive Ric Ocasek's hearse tonight?

Last time we were at Tynecastle, that boy who wears number 7 scored both goals for us so we'll put it down as an offday.

Both sets fans to unite and treat East Edinburgh to a 20,000-strong chorus of 'You're getting sacked in the morning'.

There's nothing at all ugly about that beautiful wee man or the way he wins games.