This Saturday sees United travel to Tynecastle for the first time since last season’s bitter post-split 3-0 defeat. Hearts secured 3rd and a place in Europe that day, we didn’t. Aberdeen nicked the 4th spot again and another 5th finish just didn’t reflect how we’d played. 4th flattered Aberdeen and 3rd certainly flattered Hearts after losing to Falkirk twice that season.
I’ve felt for Hearts’ fans at times recently. None of them seem to have much good to say about Vladimir Romanov or Csaba Laszlo. Even the fact that they grinded out a 3rd finish last season wouldn’t make me ever want to be a Jambo if I couldn’t be an Arab.
But the one thing that would make me want to be a Jambo is Tynecastle. It is by far my favourite stadium after Tannadice and rarely fails to generate an electric atmosphere when the stakes are high.
My favourite match of recent years is now our 2-1 win over Celtic, but a close second would have to be the CIS Semi-Final of February 2008 against Aberdeen.
A Considine effort saw us go down 1-0 after 19 minutes but Darren Dods levelled on 23 minutes followed by superb goals from Christian Kalvenes, Craig Conway and a rarity from Morgaro Gomis after capitalising on the umpteenth Langfield slapstick calamity of the night (with a little help from Diamond).
However, we have not won at Tynecastle in the SPL since October 2007.
The next meeting with Hearts that January saw us totally humiliate them with a 4-1 win with the help of three quite unbelievable red cards. It was like Hearts were on self-destruct!! But they cancelled out the three points earned that evening with a 1-0 over us at Tynecastle the following March.
2008/2009 saw us beat Hearts only once with a 3-0 victory at Tannadice that November, followed by a boring 0-0 draw at Tynecastle, a 1-0 loss at Tannadice and then that stinging 3-0 defeat in the May.
A Cadamarteri double saw us open this season brightly last August, Hearts just didn’t look like scoring all night! But this Saturday will see a very hungry Jambos side.
So far this season they have lost to us, Rangers, Celtic, St.Mirren, Motherwell and St.Johnstone. They’ve only had 4 wins in this SPL and two 0-0 draws with Hibs and Falkirk. They’re currently 7th with 13 points, 5 behind 6th place Aberdeen.
If Hearts are going to be able to justify their player wages, this Saturdays match is a ‘must win’ for them. But with just one SPL loss all season and Arabs still riding high after the Celtic defeat, it almost feels like Dundee United have all the momentum in the world right now.
It’s not often that a match at Tynecastle is being spoken of by so many as a ‘should win’ fixture. With 4 red cards shown to Hearts players last Sunday, their poor results and current team and fan morale combined with us being hot on the heels of Hibs, Celtic and Rangers suggests that we may well get an easy time of it this Saturday.
But Tynecastle has been the scene of some very bitter, unexpected and heartbreaking defeats in the past and a loss now could be the trigger for a dip in form right when we don’t need it.
Talk of being SPL champions is rife amongst Arabs. All you have to do is check the internet forums. Some are convinced that we can do it, others are more guarded and a great many still sadly believe that it will never happen in their lifetime.
But a victory this Saturday followed by at least a draw this Tuesday against Rangers will certainly give the Arab championship doubters something to think about.
In fact, I’ll say it now. I predict a 2-0 win over Hearts and a 1-1 draw with Rangers.
Fingers crossed.
C.B.