Hearts beat Celtic 2-1

[On The Edge of Insanity]

http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/scot_prem/5250704.stm

Hearts 2-1 Celtic 
 
Roman Bednar scored twice as Hearts beat defending champions Celtic at Tynecastle to go joint top of the SPL.
Bednar struck shortly after the break with a great drive past Artur Boruc and then had a valid finish ruled offside.

Stilian Petrov replied for the visitors with a brilliant strike but near the end Bednar pounced on a Neil Lennon error to deliver victory for Hearts.

Celtic manager Gordon Strachan and Hearts coach John McGlynn were sent to the stand by referee Stuart Dougal.

Celtic captain Lennon was free from suspension but Strachan had opted to leave him out of the starting line-up.

Robbie Neilson and Takis Fyssas were notable Hearts absentees, replaced by Ibrahim Tall and Lee Wallace.

There was even a last-minute change of referee, Stuart Dougal taking over from Kenny Clark who suffered a back injury.

After a high-energy start, with few clear chances, Bruno Aguiar's flighted free-kick from the left was headed past the post by Bednar.

Just before the half-hour, Tall was replaced by Neilson, after the Senegalese seemed to catch his studs in the turf.

Three minutes before the break Celtic had their first direct attempt on the Hearts goal, Kenny Miller shooting low from 20 yards, but Craig Gordon saving well.

Then Strachan and McGlynn became embroiled in a heated touchline debate after the game was halted for Hearts midfielder Julien Brellier to receive treatment.

After consulting his fourth official, referee Dougal decided to send both Strachan and McGlynn to the stand.

The second-half was thankfully a vast improvement on the first.

When Bednar spurned an easy header he soon atoned, outstripping the Celtic defence and lashing an angled left-foot shot past Artur Boruc in off the post.

The Czech marksman then had a legitimate finish ruled offside, before Celtic themselves pounced in the 65th minute for the equaliser.

A sweeping move - involving Shunsuke Nakamara, Kenny Miller and Aiden McGeady - was ended superbly by Petrov whose first-time drive rendered Gordon powerless.

But with three minutes remaining substitute Lennon's dreadful back pass was intercepted by Bednar who rounded Boruc before calmly sidefooting the winner into the Celtic net.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Hearts: Gordon, Tall, Pressley, Berra, Wallace, Mikoliunas, Aguiar, Brellier, McCann, Bednar, Pospisil.

Goals:Bednar 49, 87

Celtic: Boruc, Telfer, Caldwell, McManus, Wilson, Nakamura, Jarosik, Petrov, McGeady, Zurawski, Miller.

Goals:Petrov 65

Ref: S Dougal

 

Sets a good early marker at the start of the season for Hearts. Interesting to see if they can keep it up for the whole campaign this time though. I would help if they don't part company with two managers this season as well.

[Mac 10 †]

We are shit.  Strachan must go.

The only good point of yesterday - our goal.  Too bad it wasn't nearly enough!!

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/Azzxy8Zh7_Q" target="_blank" class="new_win">http://www.youtube.com/v/Azzxy8Zh7_Q</a>

[TheDeli]

We are shit.  Strachan must go.

Didn't look good at all today (although the goal was a good move)

Do you think that the whole agenda/questions regarding the game in Japan on Thursday has had a bad effect on the squad Mac10?

I think that if Petrov leaves you's will find it difficult to replace him

Do you think that the squad is strong enough for this season for your league & CL campaign?

Strachan is coming across as a man under pressure and feeling some stress IMO

[Mac 10 †]

He is shit. We are shit. But sadly enough if we actually play well, we will win the SPL again.

But seriously we need a decent striker up front to partner Magic. We need a LB, an experienced (decent) CB and a CM to replace petrov.

The good points are that McGeady has been pretty much amazin every game so far.

Also something to remember is that Hearts are now actually a good side.  Hearts @ Tyncastle will arguably be our hardest game this season.

[Sweet & Tender Hooligan]

We are shit.  Strachan must go.

What a load of bollocks, give the man a chance. We won the league didnt we? Won 2 more trophies than O'Neill did in the Seville season. Strachan is a likeable guy and if Quinn would give him the cash 2 buy a decent Center back, left back  and striker we would be a much improved team. Hearts are looking ok but i can garuntee they wont last the pace. If they win the league il delete my account.

And yes, The result may have had something to do with the Japan game but for the amount of money we got out of that game, il take a defeat at mini ibrox anyday...as long as the funds are put to good use.

[Mac 10 †]

We are shit.  Strachan must go.

What a load of bollocks, give the man a chance. We won the league didnt we? Won 2 more trophies than O'Neill did in the Seville season. Strachan is a likeable guy and if Quinn would give him the cash 2 buy a decent Center back, left back  and striker we would be a much improved team. Hearts are looking ok but i can garuntee they wont last the pace. If they win the league il delete my account.

And yes, The result may have had something to do with the Japan game but for the amount of money we got out of that game, il take a defeat at mini ibrox anyday...as long as the funds are put to good use.

Please do me a favour, don't ever mention Martin O'Neill and Gordon Strachan in the same sentence ever again.

Strachan won the league last season but you can't even take credit for that.  Hearts pushed us close but they weren't really up to it.

Rangers won 21 out of 38 league games last year. That's the only fact you need to worry about.

Rangers won 6 league games out of their first 17!!

I wouldn't accept credit for winning the league last year and neither should Strachan, we were the best of a crap bunch.

[TheDeli]

He is shit. We are shit. But sadly enough if we actually play well, we will win the SPL again.

Also something to remember is that Hearts are now actually a good side.  Hearts @ Tyncastle will arguably be our hardest game this season.

With regards to the first point - we won't be as poor as we were last season this season, we have already improved and with the amount of chances that we are creating we will win more  league games this season than we did last season

Hearts at Tynecastle is a very hard game but IMO it won't be your hardest game of the forthcoming league season, something tells me that you will the 4 old frim games more difficult this season than the 3 victories of the 5 of last season

PLG has already improved Rangers and after watching the game yesterday I must say that I'm not overly worried at either Hearts or Celtic this season

[KURUPTION-81]

It seems a bit harsh to be calling for strachan to be fired two games into the season, especially as u won the league last year. If i remember right u got beat 5-0 in strachans first game against some small european side yet u still turned it around and won the league.

If u were to get rid of him, who would u replace him with ?

[Mac 10 †]

It seems a bit harsh to be calling for strachan to be fired two games into the season, especially as u won the league last year. If i remember right u got beat 5-0 in strachans first game against some small european side yet u still turned it around and won the league.

If u were to get rid of him, who would u replace him with ?

Yeah we did win the league but obviously you didn't read what I said above.

We were the best team last season but that's only because the other challengers were quite poor as both the facts and TheDeli will tell you.

I don't know who they would replace him with.

And it hasn't been 2 games we've been calling for his head, it's been a season and 2 games.

[Sweet & Tender Hooligan]

Why shouldnt O'Neill be mentioned in the same breath as Strachan?....

About being the best of a bad bunch, cant the same be said for O'Neill's first 2 seasons?....Rangers were just as bad then as they are now, hence the 21 point gap.

Rangers were piss poor the 2 seasons they won the league, and tactical naivety from O'Neill was the only reason we are not on to 6 in a row by now. And we can talk about Seville costing us the league but IMO thats bullshit as if we look at the games following European games we won them all (except against ICT in the cup)....

Im not against Martin O'Neill, he is and always will be a LEGEND, but IMO he stayed a year too long, when funds werent made available his last season he should have left.


And i think Strachan bringing in lots of young Scottish lads can only be good (did you see how many tims in the scotland u19 team?) for the future, and i wish him all the best. Obviously a shocking league campaign and embarassment in Europe will turn me against him (providing he is given more funds) but until then i wish people would get off his back, the huns stuck with Big Eck through much worse......

[Mac 10 †]

the huns stuck with Big Eck through much worse......

the huns didn't stick with eck, eck jut stuck around.  90% of them wanted him gone before he eventually left.

[No Compute]

United will win the league

[TheDeli]

the huns stuck with Big Eck through much worse......

the huns didn't stick with eck, eck jut stuck around.  90% of them wanted him gone before he eventually left.

I and a vast number of fans wanted Eck gone the season of helicopter sunday and they last 2 minutes at fir park kept him on for another season - which resulted in chaos

If our chairman had managed to get PLG in before christmas - just after the Inter Milan game at Ibrox - like he tried we wouldn't have had to put up with him for the last 5 months of the season

Eck won 7 trophies for us and I wouldn't consider the man a legend - he will go down in the history books as being a success based on what he won - The same could be said about Strachan for Celtic though 1 season 2 trophies and if he wins something this season, but the manner of how they won't be considered when looked back in history, even though they weren't popular or a convincing manager

I'm just happy that we have Paul Le Guen 

[Mac 10 †]

Eck won 7 trophies for us and I wouldn't consider the man a legend - he will go down in the history books as being a success based on what he won.

He won 7 trophies in a short time, and yes it was more than O'Neill did for us.

But the only fact you really have to look at is: Celtic fans BEGGED O'Neill to stay, Rangers fan PLEADED with McLeish to go.

[Boo-Yaa †]

Bottom line is that celtic are a below average side, with only 1 or 2 players in
our current team who are good enough to wear the jersey!

We will be embarrassed in europe if the board doesnt free up some money!
And to think we are the second seeds!