Hearts forward Katie Rood 'showed how good she is' in dominant performance against Hamilton

Assistant manager Sean Burt believes Katie Rood ‘showed how good she is’ after her brace helped Hearts hammer Hamilton in the SWPL1.

Goals from Georgie Timms, Calin Michie, Rood and Jenny Smith rounded off a perfect 5-0 performance for the Jam Tarts at the Oriam as they returned to winning ways in style. After going two games without a win in the league Hearts produced a dominant performance against Hamilton from start to finish to further increase their grip on fourth place. Burt heaped praise on Rood after her performance believing that the club ‘saw the best of her’ on Sunday.

“I am so happy for Rood, she works so hard in training”, he told Edinburgh Evening News. “She recently had an injury with her hand as well so we have been kind of been nursing that. She showed today how good a player she is. From minute one, she is a real threat cutting inside, you can see it from her goal here. Great finish. Technically a fantastic player; today we have seen the best of her.”

The Jam Tarts dominated the first half and opened the scoring just 13 minutes in through Timms. Erin Rennie whipped a smart ball to the front post with Timms meeting it with an intelligent run and smashed it into the top right corner. Hearts would deservedly double their lead five minutes before the break with Timms being involved once again. The striker had the time to elegantly take the ball around the keeper and place a perfect pass to Michie who placed it into an empty net.

Rood signed from Southampton in the summer and has already made her presence known in the SWPL.

Timms almost got her second 66 minutes in as she almost squeezed around the keeper to get her shot away but it would only hit the post. The third would come only two minutes later with Rood scoring a spectacular goal. Picking the ball up on the edge of the area, she would curl it beautifully to allow it to nestle into the bottom left corner.

It was Smith who would later join the wonder goal club to make it four with six minutes to go. Receiving the ball about 25 yards out, the midfielder hit a powerful effort which would bounce in off the bar. Rood would round off a brilliant performance from herself and the team as she played a quick give-and-go with Aimee Anderson and dinked the ball over the keeper to give the New Zealander her brace in stoppage time.

“Brilliant performance, absolutely fantastic”, Burt stated. “I touched on it at the end with the ladies. It was arguably our most complete performance this season. The way we built up from the back was quick, how we were clinical in the final third, constantly creating chances as well was a massive positive. Overall, five goals and a clean sheet, it doesn’t get much better than that.

“Last time [against Hamilton] we had several opportunities as well and it could have been a lot more comfortable. We had a shaky end to the game but coming back onto the home pitch we wanted to have a real emphasis on how we were going to attack them. We did that and you can see we did it from the off. We were creating opportunities right away and thankfully today we have taken them.”