Craig Gordon insists Hearts can still finish third and explains response to fan fury
Craig Gordon insists Hearts can still achieve their targets this season despite sitting bottom the Premiership with just one point.
Winless Jambos sacked head coach Steven Naismith yesterday after an eighth straight defeat on Saturday with St Mirren the latest to put them to the sword. They sit 14 points behind unbeaten Aberdeen who are now clear favourites for third, although the Dons may even have loftier ambitions as they sit second, five points ahead of Rangers.
The Tynecastle side go into each season targeting the best of the rest slot and a domestic trophy and it will take a monumental effort for a new boss to come in and generate the sort of form that would achieve that. Gordon insists it is possible but has called on his teammates to start pulling their weight.
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He said: "Yes, our targets are still achievable. It's going to take everybody in that squad to come together. Everybody's going to have to do their share of the workload now.
"We've got a lot of games coming up with the European games added in there. We're going to need absolutely everybody. People are going to have to come to the table, start producing and help us get up this league and also help us to compete in Europe as well."
Post-match at the SMISA Stadium saw an outpouring of anger from the away end. Captain Lawrence Shankland was the only player to go near the support as the rest kept their distance.
Gordon explained why: "I just took it in, stood and watched. You can see the frustrations. They don't want us to go over there and clap them. They want us to win football matches. I was just watching it and seeing the frustration that they have and we share as well.
"Now it's just up to us to work even harder to double down and make sure that we're winning the next one because this can't keep going on. We need to change it and as a group of players it needs to happen now.
"Hearts is a club that is always better when everybody is sticking together. I know they're not happy right now but that is when we need everybody together and to pull in the same direction.
"If we can get that then that gives us that extra edge that when things are not going well we're probably one of the better teams at pulling ourselves apart. It's down to us to stick together. The players definitely will."