Gary Mackay: Hearts and Inverness showing others in Scottish football how to work together

Inverness manager John Robertson with Hearts winger Jamie Walker.

Football is ultimately about results and that’s no different in Scotland. However, more often than not, you want clubs to work with one another rather than against each other.

It’s been painfully obvious over the last few years that, in certain circumstances, that hasn’t always been the case. This time there is genuine mutual respect and this is a great gesture from the Hearts supporters.

The game has sold out virtually and sales are now over 8,000. It’s not just people based in Edinburgh, it’s fans from countries all across the world taking part. I think it’s wonderful.

Inverness do have a Hearts legend as their manager – John Robertson – and one of our former chief executives working there as well, so there is a link there and it’s led to this extremely positive story.

It shows what the Hearts community is like, not just towards our own club but others with whom there is that mutual respect. The club has always been active within our own community but it’s an even bigger gesture to support another club.

And at this time in particular, when everybody has suffered to some degree for a number of months due to this pandemic, it’s brilliant for so much good to be done. I’m just a bit miffed that it was Stevie Kilgour’s idea and not mine.

Hearts have always tried to treat other clubs with the respect that they wanted themselves. Some of those other clubs have maybe chosen to go down a different route.

With teams like Inverness, Partick Thistle and Stranraer, it’s been proven that mutual respect can work in Scottish football. It doesn’t always need to be every man for himself. It can be about ‘us’ rather than just ‘me’.

Fans can get a signed thank you letter from Robbo for their efforts and that will mean a lot to many people. That’s if you buy the £10 virtual ticket. I’m only going for the £5 one because I’ve got enough of Robbo’s autographs.

It would be wonderful if we were able to get even a few thousands of these fans into the ground at Inverness in a couple of weeks’ time. What a difference that would make because there is no doubt every football match is lacking that atmosphere at the moment.

It’s very unlikely that will happen this season so I suspect it’s a wee bit away yet. My long-term hope is that, when Hearts next play Inverness in front of fans, it is in the Premiership.

All of us supporters are desperate to see Hearts back in the top flight for next season but it would be great if Caley Thistle could join us by getting through the play-offs.

If that doesn’t happen this year, then hopefully it’s the year after. It would be nice to see that relationship between the two sets of fans in person inside a stadium.

Inverness have all the infrastructure there to become a Premiership club again and Robbo’s teams always play attacking football. They would be a worthy addition.

Lewis Moore reveals his Hearts career is over after being told he has no future ...

A message from the Editor: Thank you for reading this article. We're more reliant on your support than ever as the shift in consumer habits brought about by Coronavirus impacts our advertisers. If you haven't already, please consider supporting our sports coverage with a digital sports subscription.