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Spectacular performance to seal Dinamo victory |
Michael Stewart and Marius Zaliukas netted the goals that handed Hearts a deserved victory over Dinamo Zagreb in tonight's UEFA Europa League Play-Off second leg. It was not enough to make up for a 4-0 defeat in Croatia last week, but plenty of pride was certainly restored for those in maroon.
There was pre-match drama at Tynecastle first, though. A generator brought in as back-up for the evening - as part of UEFA requirements - blew and took with it one of the flood lights. There was deliberation on the pitch with UEFA officials, the referee and security officials as to whether the game could go ahead with three floodlights working. Eventually, less than 45 minutes before kick off, Knut Kircher deemed that the match would go ahead, to the relief of everyone in the stadium.
Gary Glen partnered Christian Nade in attack with Craig Thomson making his competitive debut for the club. Laszlo decided not to risk Lee Wallace, who was still struggling, and instead Jose Goncalves took his place at left back.
Hearts made a bright start to the match and looked a different side to the one that had faced Dinamo Zagreb seven days earlier. Obua, Goncalves and Glen in particular were in the heart of all of the action as Hearts pressed Zagreb on every ball. Craig Thomson looked at home and made some cracking attacking runs which really opened up the Zagreb defence.
The home side's pressure paid off on 18 minutes when Butina played the ball out to his defender who in turn slipped leaving Michael Stewart to intercept and glide the ball past the Zagreb keeper.
Morales could have levelled minutes later with a cracking shot from inside the box, Balogh however saved well. Hearts took confidence from this and pushed further and further into Zagreb's half. Stewart could have made it two 10 minutes later with a snapshot that rattled off the top of the bar. This was an entirely different performance from the Jambos; they were taking the game to the visitors.
The tempo started to dip leading up to half time but that was to be expected given the effort and input exerted by the boys in maroon in the opening 45 minutes.
Hearts emerged from the dressing room at half time with a renewed sense of purpose and quickly upped the ante to that of early in the first half.
After taking a fairly hefty knock in the face early in the half Marius Zaliukas took the liberty of also putting Hearts two up. Suso whipped in a corner which the Zagreb defence failed to deal with and there was Marius to slot the ball past the stranded Butina.
Hearts continued to throw everything at Dinamo including the welcome return of Andrew Driver. The winger playing his first game of the season was all over the pitch in a bid to try and pile as much pressure on the Zagreb defence as possible.
Dinamo fired a warning shot soon after through Milan Badelj who unleashed a ferocious shot, Balogh reacted well and got enough of a touch on the ball to send it over the bar. It wasn't the last time Balogh was called upon as Zagreb looked to deal Hearts the ultimate blow of securing an away goal. Balogh though was on hand again to extinguish a powerful shot from Papadopoulos.
The game petered out towards the end with Zagreb piling on defenders in the hope of shutting up shop.
As the German referee Knut Kircher blew his whistle and brought the curtain down on Hearts UEFA Europa League campaign Tynecastle was filled with rapturous applause. And rightly so.
Hearts: Balogh; C Thomson, Bouzid, Zaliukas, Goncalves; Suso, Stewart, Palazuelos (Black 81), Obua; Glen (Driver 59), Nade (Smith 54). Subs not used: Kello, Kucharski, Novikovas, J Thomson.
Dinamo Zagreb: Butina; Lovren, Biscan, Barbaric, Carlos; Morales (Calello 85), Vrdoljak, Badelj, Sammir (Tomecak 67); Mandzukic, Papadopoulos (Slepicka88). Subs not used: Loncaric, Kramaric, Glavina, Sivonjic.
Referee: Knut Kircher
Top man: Craig Thomson
Hearts.TV is LIVE on air with full video coverage of tonight's game against Dinamo Zagreb from 7.30pm with Paul Mitchell and John Robertson
