Robbie Neilson points finger at Hearts defending and 'basic football' errors in defeat to Dundee

After the weekend collapse at away to Rangers, the last thing Hearts boss Robbie Neilson wanted was to concede any more easy goals, especially at home and to the team stuck at the foot of the Premiership table.

Hearts manager Robbie Neilson cuts a frustrated figure at full-time after the 2-1 defeat to Dundee at Tynecastle. (Photo by Paul Devlin / SNS Group)

But, despite being in control throughout the first half against Dundee, two sloppy second half goals cost them all three points and left the Gorgie boss annoyed.

“My biggest frustration to be honest was defensively. I thought we were very poor at the two goals.

“I’m very, very disappointed. We’ve had a brilliant defensive record recently. But at this moment in time we’ve not and we need to get back to that.

“We’re maybe not taking the chances we should. But at our end of the park we should be miles better.

“I thought first-half we were very, very good defensively. We never really gave up much.

“But there were moments in the second half where the ball goes long, gets knocked down - you’ve got to go win that first contact.

“For the first goal we let a midfield runner run off us, which isn’t good enough.

“Then for the second we don’t deal with it at the back post. That’s basic football.

“We played very well in the first half. Created loads of good chances and were in total control. But we didn’t take these chances and started to get a bit over-complacent.

“We had been quite aggressive in our passing. We went behind them and ran in behind them. Second half we were too static. It was all side to side and not enough penetration.”

Still sitting comfortably in third place, he said it is important that they get back to winning ways on Saturday, when they host Livingston in the Scottish Cup.

"I thought we did bounce back in the first half. That's what we wanted to do and we were very good but we didn't score enough goals in the key moments. But I still think that if we defended properly we would have got a 1-0 and gone up the road, but we didn't.

“We are going to have wee periods like this in the season where we don't get what we want in the games, but we need to try and get back on the horse as quickly as we can."

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