Sergio keeps merry-making to a minimum

Having had his own difficulties, namely the much-publicised unpaid wages saga, to contend with, the Tynecastle manager hasn’t been slow to offer sympathy to Ally McCoist, his embattled Rangers counterpart.

And on Saturday, there was no gloating or chest-beating from the amiable Portuguese as he acclaimed his side’s first league win since 14 January in humble fashion. Although he acknowledged that the victory gave him “a fantastic feeling”, Sergio told Hearts TV: “It’s our first win in six games and that is very pleasing but I don’t want to talk any more about the game as a sign of respect to the players of Rangers, their professionalism for their difficulties and their supporters.

“The victories always help us when we want to try and improve but that’s all I want to say.”

Hearts’ travelling support have had little to cheer this season with their club having the worst away scoring record in Scotland, with just eight league goals on the road, until Saturday. But the goals from Ian Black and Jamie Hamill at Ibrox saw them score more than one goal on their travels for only the third time this season, with the other two occasions coming away to the SPL’s bottom two, Dunfermline and Hibernian. This brace of goals also lifted Hearts above a quartet of Scottish clubs and off the bottom of the away scoring charts.

Sergio was grateful to his hardened travelling support for sticking with the team throughout such dismal away exploits and was pleased to reward them with their best result of the season. He said: “I want to thank our brilliant fans for their support. It was very loud here today but we heard everything our supporters said.”

Hamill’s winning goal continued a mini tradition for those by that surname as, by a quirk of fate, the last player in maroon to score a winner in Govan was Joe Hamill, who struck in a 1-0 success under Craig Levein in May 2004. Their last win before that was the 3-0 success in 1996 when a young Allan Johnston scored a hat-trick.