Exclusive:Hearts player blasts four goals as new man features in an emphatic friendly win

Hearts staged a friendly against St Johnstone at Riccarton to give certain players much-needed game time during the international break. Neil Critchley’s team ran out comfortable 4-1 winners against their William Hill Premiership counterparts, with all four strikes coming from one man.

Alan Forrest claimed a quadruple to enhance his chances of more competitive action at first-team level. He fell out of the Hearts team in recent months but was on fire in the closed-door game at the Edinburgh club’s training ground.

Australian midfielder Cammy Devlin made an appearance for his first runout since suffering concussion in last month’s Scottish Cup tie at St Mirren. Another notable feature of the match was defender Harry Milne’s first outing for Hearts since his January transfer from Partick Thistle.

Critchley is without a number of senior players due to international commitments and used the game to assess some younger men from the B team as well as first-team squad members. Forrest lined up in an attacking wide role and displayed a clinical side to his game by scoring four times. Devlin lined up in central midfield with Milne on the left side of defence.

The Hearts starting line-up had Ryan Fulton in goal, with teenagers Kai Smutek and Kenzie Nair in defence alongside Milne. Musa Drammeh, Calem Nieuwenhof, Devlin, Forrest, Yan Dhanda, Yutaro Oda and Barrie McKay were also in the team from kick-off. Substitutes were youngsters Lyndon Tas, Lucas Smith, Gregor Crookston and Aidan Haddow.

Celtic to come in Glasgow as Premiership top-six heads towards nitty-gritty

Critchley oversaw Hearts’ 2-0 Premiership win over Ross County last Saturday, a result which propelled the Edinburgh club into the top six. They are not in action this weekend due to international fortnight but league business resumes with a visit to Glasgow to face Celtic on Saturday, 29 March.

The head coach is hopeful that defender Jamie McCart will be fit for that game. Fellow defenders Frankie Kent, Stephen Kingsley and Craig Halkett are also working to return from injury. “We're hoping that after the break, when we come back in preparation for the Celtic game, around that week or maybe the week after, one or two of those players will be able to join back in training,” said Critchley.

“But they've been out for a significant period of time, so they'll probably need a period of training with the group first before we consider them for selection. We want a competitive squad and we want to be playing in big games. I'm sure all the players will be wanting to be starting in that game, so the next few weeks will be really important.”

Discussing Hearts’ plans for international fortnight a few days ago, Critchley stated: “We'll make sure we do get some rest. We'll be here for a few days training and a game for the players who have not been playing as much recently. That's important for them. But they'll also get some period of rest because when we come back, we're into a really important stage of the season with some big games and a hectic schedule. So we'll use this period to rest, recuperate and ready to go again.”

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