Hearts camp play down Celtic rivalry and insist Edinburgh derby is bigger

In a season with no Old Firm matches as yet, the search has been going on to find an encounter that could come close in terms of excitement, atmosphere and the element of ‘history’ between the teams.

Tomorrow at Parkhead, Celtic take on Hearts, and pre-season, that was many people’s idea of the nearest thing to an Old Firm match, certainly in terms of competitiveness.

They do not see it that way at Tynecastle. As Danny Grainger of Hearts explained: “If you’re a neutral you would probably look at this being one of the bigger games in the league fixtures. But there’s bigger games for the Hearts fans – there’s the derbies.”

His manager John McGlynn agrees: “We’ve still got Hibs to play so we would never view it that way – we’ve still got our derby game.

“But, without Rangers in the league, Celtic might look at it differently. Over the years, things have happened in Celtic-Hearts games, haven’t they?

“So there is a case for saying that this is a really big game in Scottish terms, 
always has been.

“But the same approach applies for us as always – we go there, play the game and see what happens.”

To judge by the compliments heading Celtic’s way from Grainger and McGlynn yesterday, there’s certainly no vitriol in their feelings towards tomorrow’s opponents – quite the contrary, following the Glasgow club’s away win against Spartak Moscow in the Champions League.

“It’s going to lift their confidence I imagine,” said McGlynn, “it was a great victory for them.

“First of all I congratulate Neil Lennon and his players. It could go a long way to getting them into the next phase.”

Grainger concurred: “Celtic looked very good. We all know they’re a top team and have played well in the two Champions League games so far, maybe proven a few people wrong and that the Scottish game isn’t as bad as people say it is. Credit to them but it’s down to us to try and get a result.”

To restrict Celtic, Hearts must surely go all out to prevent Gary Hooper from extending his marvellous scoring run. It will be a difficult task, especially when you learn that Grainger is convinced that his fellow Englishman will soon be appearing in the white-shirted team managed by Roy Hodgson.

Grainger said: “He’s a top player and I think it’s just a matter of time before he gets a phone call to go and play in the England team. You can’t ignore a player who is scoring the amount of goals that Gary Hooper’s scoring.

“Roy Hodgson isn’t ignoring the Celtic players as he’s shown by picking Fraser Foster. The Champions League is helping them a lot because they are playing on a bigger stage, and he is definitely looking at Celtic players to be in his squad and that’s why I say it’s just a matter of time before Hooper gets the call.

“Anyone that’s scoring goals for England I’m happy to see them in the squad. He’s a hard player to play against, he’s intelligent. But our two centre halves are international players and we have plenty of ability to cope with Gary Hooper.”

Asked what plans he had to shackle Hooper, manager McGlynn replied simply: “You have Commons, Forrest, Brown, Wanyama and Izaguirre, how far do you want me to go?”

Grainger agreed: “It’s not just Gary Hooper we need to worry about come Sunday – they’ve got 11 players on that pitch that we have to be on top of our game to stop.”

Grainger for one is convinced that Hearts could be turning the corner after a mixed beginning to the league that has featured poor home form. “We have not made the start to the season we would have wanted but it is still very early in the season,” he said.

“There’s no reason why we can’t kick on from here whether we get a result on Sunday or not. I wouldn’t say it is dead and buried from there.

“It’s a massive game after dropping so many points at home this season.

“It doesn’t matter whether it’s Celtic or Dundee or Kilmarnock or Inverness – we have to win games, and if we don’t win games we can’t be challenging. It’s not about anyone else, it’s about us in the dressing room, and we need to start putting things right on the pitch and getting results.

“We are creating chances and that’s the positive thing. If we weren’t creating chances then we would be worried but we are making chances and it’s silly little things at the back that are being punished.

“I don’t think we are far away from becoming a really good team and once we click together then it’s only a matter of time before we get the results and get ourselves up the table.”

For McGlynn, the important thing is for everyone associated with Hearts to temper their expectations at present. “I’m not sure that everyone is realising that yet,” said McGlynn. “I think people in football realise that this is a difficult job because of the amount of players we lost in the summer and we didn’t really get the opportunity to replace the players we lost in the summer. There has to be a realism. We are certainly in a transitional period.”

But sounding a positive note, he added: “We have a lot of experienced players here and I don’t think we’re playing badly.”