Goodwin sickened by extra helping of bad luck

A GOAL contentiously disallowed, a key defender taken off injured and another shown a debatable red card.

Little wonder Jim Goodwin left Tynecastle

wondering just why he deserved such a brutal visitation from Lady Luck.

Fear of further retribution from the Scottish FA stopped him meting out too much criticism in the direction of referee Alan Muir or the stand-side assistant who flagged Richard Tait offside, but ultimately he also acknowledged that better finishing from his front players could have secured a better outcome.

Nevertheless, he addressed the three big incidents one by one. First, Tait’s chalkedoff strike in first-half stoppage-time: ‘It looks very tight. Unfortunately, the angle we have is too far away to give a definitive answer. You would like it to go in your favour but if the linesman has got it right, then fair play to him — it’s a hell of a call.

‘I thought it was a great ball, a good run and a fantastic finish as well. We don’t seem to get those decisions at the moment. I don’t want to go on about it because I could say something stupid and Sportscene shows it was a brilliant decision.’

Muir had added four minutes extra on account of the injury that saw Scott Tanser hobble off. ‘I don’t know the full extent of it,’ added Goodwin. ‘He’ll be in with the physio in the morning and, hopefully, it will settle down. He wouldn’t have come off if it wasn’t serious.

‘We don’t need another injury at the back with Conor McCarthy out long term. We have only just got Charles Dunne back.’

Regarding the second yellow card shown to Joe Shaughnessy near the end, he was understanding of the referee’s decision, if frustrated at the lack of clemency so late on.

‘I can see why Alan Muir’s come to that decision,’ he conceded. ‘Joe was last man and there’s a bit of grappling on the edge of the box.

‘But in the 95th minute when Hearts are 2-0 up and the game is done I don’t think anybody would have minded if the referee had turned a blind eye.’

Goodwin added: ‘The big frustration for me today is that at 0-0 we’re the better team. Ultimately, you have to put the ball in the net to win games and today we haven’t done that.’