Exclusive:Front-foot Hearts bid to keep fans on side

A direct approach laced with width and pace helped Hearts resemble themselves again last weekend. The 3-1 win at Ross County was the first of Liam Fox’s second spell as interim head coach following Neil Critchley’s dismissal. There were signs of positivity in a bid to get disgruntled fans back on side, although it should be remembered that the Dingwall trip amounted to one game only.

Lawrence Shankland’s goals, Alan Forrest’s strike and Kenneth Vargas’ assist all justified Fox’s team selection. While Critchley favoured a diamond-shaped midfielder, or a 4-2-3-1 set-up with inverted wide players, Fox went 4-3-3 with the intention of going at County. Forrest and Vargas flanked Shankland to marry two speedy wingers with a natural goalscorer in attack. The move paid dividends.

Supporters, though, require more than a win at the Scottish Premiership’s second-bottom team to lift their anger. Hearts simply should not be ensconced in the league’s bottom half given their resources, and fans are exasperated by this season’s underperformance. They let rip at the club’s board in Dingwall with chants at chief executive Andrew McKinlay and chairwoman Ann Budge, none of whom were in attendance on the day.

Speaking exclusively to the Edinburgh News, Fox acknowledged the need to unify everyone connected . “Yes, we heard them,” he said of the chants. “My remit is to take the team to the end of the season. It would be really good if everybody could stick together and stay united. I understand that's difficult off a bad season and some poor results and poor performances. All we can do is focus on Motherwell this week, go about it as we did last week, hopefully put on another positive performance and hopefully finish the season strong.”

He aims to do that with more of the same on the field - speed, width and goals. “Having previously done this kind of role before, and also being a manager in the Premiership before, definitely gives you that wee bit of assurance and a bit of something to reference,” he explained. “For me, it was about trying to put a team on the pitch that replicated what I wanted the team to be like. I wanted width in the team, I wanted a bit more speed in the team and that's no slight on anybody that's been before. That's just how I see it and how I thought this was the best way to get us the result. So, some people got opportunities, but that was off the back of how I see the game and how they performed and how they trained last week.”

Shankland and Hearts find resolve to win key Premiership fixture

Hearts seemed to lack confidence at times in the first half and the fans’ ire took hold after Ronan Hale put Ross County 1-0 ahead. Fox’s team showed resilience to recover and enjoyed a far more convincing second-half display. “I think that's fair,” he admitted. “I also think going a goal behind - I'm not sure how many attempts Ross County had on goal before they actually scored - there was definitely a feeling of 'we've been here before'.

“What pleased me the most was the response to that. We still kept being brave, we still kept passing the ball, we still kept looking forward and the group began to grow in a bit more confidence. Obviously, we get the goal before half-time and that gives everybody a shot in the arm. It just gave us that wee bit more belief and a bit more confidence. So, the game is about moments and that was a big moment. Lawrence stepped up for the team and I was pleased with a lot of aspects of the second half. I was actually pleased with some of the attacking play and some of the counter-attack stuff, but also really pleased actually how we defended the box.”

The importance of mining reserves of character so visibly was also not lost on the interim head coach. “Absolutely. Again, that's probably my biggest takeaway is that they didn't go under,” said Fox.” We stayed strong, we stood up to it, we fronted up and sometimes that's what you need to do in football. You need to figure it out and find a way to get through these moments and then just keep believing in what you're doing. I think that was the thing we spoke about at half-time - the belief to go on and win the game, because we could have sat back a bit.

“No, we want to go on and win, we want to play on the front foot, we want to play forward, we want to play quick. We got moments of that in the second half. I'm just really pleased for the players because, as you say, it's been a disappointing season. We know that. There's no hiding from that. There's no getting away from that. We didn't go down the road absolutely celebrating, jumping up and down, but hopefully it gives them a shot in the arm and moves us forward to what is another big game next week.”

READ MORE: Hearts get a lot more than £10m from Tony Bloom