Hearts v Hamilton: Daniel Stendel speaks on progress as Hearts face most critical match since exiting administration

Daniel Stendel is hoping for a positive result against Hamilton

There is no understating the importance of Hearts’ bottom-of-the-table showdown with Hamilton Accies this afternoon.

A home defeat against the side immediately above them would leave the Tynecastle side four points adrift at the foot of the table with just 11 games to play and staring at the catastrophic prospect of a second relegation in the space of just six years.

A victory, however, would move Daniel Stendel’s side above Accies and off the bottom, breathing fresh life into their own hitherto unconvincing survival bid while simultaneously landing a significant blow on the Lanarkshire side. This feels like the Tynecastle side’s most critical match since they emerged from administration in 2014.

Win against Accies can spark forward movement

“This game will not decide what happens at the end of the season but it’s a big chance to make the right step for the rest of the season,” said Stendel. “It’s the best situation that you have a game against your direct rival. With a win we can jump over Hamilton and that can give the right step for the next weeks.”

Finding some momentum will be crucial to Hearts’ survival hopes. After today’s match they face second-bottom St Mirren in Paisley next Friday. If they can get their noses in front of those two sides in the coming weeks, they are entitled to feel they have a chance of staying there since they have no more league matches against either Celtic or Rangers to play.

Hamilton travel to Ibrox a week on Tuesday while St Mirren still have both members of the Old Firm to play. In the meantime, a good points return from Hearts’ next two games is imperative. “The next two games are the biggest games I've been involved in since I've been at this club,” said Jamie Walker, who this week made his 200th appearance for the club. “We need to win.”

Walker knows from painful experience that Hearts are not too big a club to go down. He was part of the side relegated in 2013/14, albeit there are notable differences in circumstances between the administration-ravaged young side that went down under Gary Locke and the current expensively-assembled side which was expected to challenge for Europe rather than become embroiled in a survival scrap.

Asked what the difference is between this side and the one that went down valiantly in 2014, Walker said: "We've got better players now. We’ve got higher quality players that have played at a better level than most of the players that we had before. Most of them were young kids and we had the 15-point deduction. No-one expected us to be in this situation this season but we can’t mope around, we need to get on with it."

Walker was straight and to the point when discussing why Hearts have found themselves in such peril. "A bit of everything,” he mused. “We had a few injuries at the start of the season but the main reason is that the players that have been on the pitch haven't produced good enough performances."

Signs of recovery?

There have been signs since Stendel took over that the team might be about to take off and haul themselves to safety but ultimately they have collected only six points from a possible 30 (0.6 points per game) since the German’s arrival two months ago.

For context, caretaker manager Austin MacPhee took four points from his five games in charge (0.8 per game), while Craig Levein, the last permanent manager, took eight points from the opening 11 games of the season (0.72 per game) before he was sacked on Halloween. In short, there has been no upturn in the team’s ability to win matches since the managerial change.

Asked if he felt Hearts were starting to move in the right direction, Stendel said: “After the Rangers game you would say ‘yes’, two weeks later you would say, ‘I don’t know’. Not one game decides our situation. I would expect to fight until the last games. We have the chance to achieve our goals alone and not have help from other teams.”

The next week will go a long way to deciding which way Hearts are headed.