Hearts pull winger Josh Ginnelly out of training

Hearts winger Josh Ginnelly remains doubtful for Tuesday’s match with Alloa after pulling out of training.

A thigh problem is still causing the player discomfort and it remains to be seen if he will be available. He trained with the first-team squad at Riccarton last week but was withdrawn after complaining that the injury did not feel right.

Medical staff will assess Ginnelly today and tomorrow before a decision is made on whether he makes the squad to play Alloa.

The two teams meet in the Championship at Tynecastle Park and then again at the Indodrill Stadium in the last 16 of the Betfred Cup at the weekend.

Hearts winger Josh Ginnelly is still feeling the effects of a thigh injury.

Ginnelly has missed Hearts’ last four matches, including Friday night’s defeat at Dunfermline, after sustaining the injury at Arbroath last month.

"Hopefully we will have him for Tuesday. If not, then definitely for Saturday,” Hearts manager Robbie Neilson told the Evening News.

“We just need to see how he is and be careful we don’t re-injure him. He came back and trained last week, then felt it a wee bit again so we took him back out.”

Austrian midfielder Peter Haring was also not risked at Dunfermline due to a small niggle. “It was the same with Peter,” added Neilson.

"He had trained but we just felt that if we’d put him on the bench and used him it could re-injure him. Then we could lose him for an extended period. Hopefully a couple of days’ rest will clear it all up.”

Neilson dissected the 2-1 loss at East End Park after coming to terms with the fact Hearts’ 100 per cent record had gone.

Goals from Dom Thomas and Euan Murray won the game for Dunfermline despite Stephen Kingsley’s late header reducing the deficit for the visitors.

Victory over Alloa in their game in hand would take Hearts to within a point of Dunfermline, who now sit three points clear at the top of the Championship.

“I couldn’t fault the players’ workrate on Friday but I think the quality could have been better at times,” he said. “You get games like that where you want a wee bit of composure to play a pass so we will work on it.

"Everyone in the group is disappointed because we wanted to continue winning, winning, winning. You are going to lose so we have to learn from it and make sure we rectify it.

“I just said that we are going to lose football matches. For periods of the game we played well and created chances but we lost a poor goal.

"We let the lad Thomas come inside, we knew he was left-footed, his shot takes a deflection and it’s a goal. That changes the dynamic of the game.

"The second one is poor marking at a corner-kick. We created two or three really good chances and had some good play.

"It was a disappointing night. We’ve dropped points but we have to move on to Alloa and win that game now.”

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