St Johnstone were breathing a little easier on Sunday after it emerged that defender Danny Grainger is not seriously injured.
Grainger Saints’ only out-and-out left-back underwent a scan on Sunday after being stretchered off against Hearts on Saturday.
That hospital check saw off fears that he had damaged the lateral ligament in his right knee.
Manager Derek McInnes said, “Thankfully there’s no lasting damage.
“The ligament is fine, it’s just severe bone bruising.”
He added, “Danny would be doubtful for this coming weekend against Aberdeen, but we wouldn’t envisage him missing another game, which is a big relief.”
Saints are, however, still teetering on the brink defensively for the visit of the Dons they have only six natural defenders in their squad and, regardless of whether Grainger recovers, they will be missing Steven Anderson after his red card at Tynecastle, while Dave Mackay is being dogged by a back complaint.
Mackay only faced Hearts after taking a pain-killing jag and he had to be substituted after the back stiffened up during the interval as the injection wore off.
The McDiarmid Park outfit know that for the problem to clear he would ideally need a couple of weeks’ complete rest, so a short-term signing could be on the cards.”Thin on the ground defensively”McInnes said, “We are thin on the ground defensively and we’ll assess the injuries and if we feel we need to bring someone in we may look to do that.”
Anderson spoiled an otherwise outstanding display by being red carded for a needless challenge on Suso Santana, and Saints that his situation is of his own making.
The finger of blame for Grainger’s plight, though, was being pointed at Calum Elliot who the Perth players felt had shoved him into the far post as he defended a Craig Thomson free-kick.
Saints reckoned Elliot’s involvement was, if not malicious, then certainly reckless.
“I didn’t see too much of what happened myself but everyone says the lad has run and pushed Danny on to the post,” said Anderson’s central defensive partner Michael Duberry.
“Only he (Elliot) can answer whether he just couldn’t stop himself or did it on purpose.”
He added, “As for Ando, he’ll look back on what happened and be disappointed because up until then he’d had a very good game.”
The price paid in terms of Grainger and Anderson being sidelined apart, this was a pleasing first day of the season for Saints, who will have been encouraged with the debuts made by Sam Parkin, Marcus Haber and Peter Enckelman.
The front pair worked their socks off and look like they will be a handful for SPL defences while Enckelman cut an assured, experienced figure in a goal.Made it “difficult for ourselves”McInnes said, “We made things a lot more difficult for ourselves than it needed to be.
“But we’ll take the point and the many positives there were from the performance.”
He added, “We really battled our corner especially when we went down to 10 men.”
The manager was far from happy with Anderson, though, even if he questioned whether similar challenges will, as the season unfolds, all result in dismissals.
McInnes said, “Ando’s was a really stupid challenge and I’m not going to defend it.
“He’s not a kid any more. He has to be better than that.”
Much had been made in advance of Saturday of Hearts being short-handed.
But with Duberry and Mackay hardly having trained all week, Saints had been unable to do any sort of work with their defensive unit leading up to the game that was evident early on, as they struggled to handle Hearts’ pace and movement.
And their inability to close the Jam Tarts down with sufficient haste might have been costly most notably when David Templeton latched on to an Ian Black feed, cut inside and sent a right-foot effort whistling wide of the target.Threat going forwardGoing forward, though, they were, without creating very much, a handful for the home rearguard, who seemed unsettled by the physical presence of Parkin and Haber and a threat at set-plays in the air supplemented by Duberry.
The loss of Grainger required Liam Craig making his 100th appearance for the club to switch to full-back with Cleveland Taylor filling the left-sided midfield vacancy.
That re-shuffle nearly cost Saints dear as, with Craig still settling in, he lost Craig Thomson at Lee Wallace’s deep cross and was relieved to see Thomson side-foot over when he should have burst the net.
The half finished in storming fashion, with two goals in a matter of seconds.
Hearts took the lead almost bang on the 45-minute mark as Elliot beat Craig and Enckelman to a near-post Wallace cross and glanced home.
But, almost straight from kick-off, Taylor skinned full-back Jason Thomson and, although his delivery was a little behind Parkin, the powerful hitman, leaning backwards, steered a header beyond the despairing dive of Marian Kello.
With Hearts upping the tempo following the re-start Saints made a further defensive switch, sending Kevin Rutkiewicz on for the labouring Mackay and moving Anderson to right-back.
But with Duberry and Anderson having grown into the game Saints looked capable of withstanding whatever was thrown at them so Hearts introduced Kevin Kyle and Stephen Elliott from the bench to try a different tack.
The visitors did not want to settle for a draw either and replaced Haber with Collin Samuel but they were left with no choice but to shut up shop when, with 16 minutes left, Anderson lunged in on Santana and was shown a straight red.
It was to Saints’ credit and that of Duberry that they held out. The one time his side were utterly exposed, Duberry somehow cleared Kyle’s header from Arvydas Novikovas’ cross off the line.
That represented quite an intervention and one the former Chelsea man hope team-mates will be sufficiently appreciative of to give him peace.
He said, “I was getting stick on training on Friday when we were doing heading practice.
“The lads were taking the mickey out of the shape of my head. The politest thing they said was that I’d a head like a 50 pence coin.”
He added, “Well, it paid dividends today and I’ll need to give a DVD of the clearance out to the kids to show them how to do it.
“We had to use all our experience towards the end when it was backs-to-the-wall time. But we dug in and showed the kind of spirit we have at the club.”
Finally, a word on referee Stevie O’Reilly. Tynecastle can be an intimidating venue to officiate at with the crowd right on top of the playing surface, but O’Reilly stayed in control of a keenly-contested 90 minutes without flashing card after card and got most of the big decisions right.
He had no alternative but to book Morris and Mackay after the pair took turns in going right through the back of Elliot, was right in dismissing Anderson, spot on in cautioning Suso for diving in an effort to get Morris sent off and yellow carding Wallace for catching Taylor.
The visitors did not want to settle for a draw either and replaced Haber with Collin Samuel but they were left with no choice but to shut up shop when, with 16 minutes left, Anderson lunged in on Santana and was shown a straight red.
It was to Saints’ credit and that of Duberry that they held out. The one time his side were utterly exposed, Duberry somehow cleared Kyle’s header from Arvydas Novikovas’ cross off the line.
That represented quite an intervention and one the former Chelsea man hope team-mates will be sufficiently appreciative of to give him peace.
He said, “I was getting stick on training on Friday when we were doing heading practice.
“The lads were taking the mickey out of the shape of my head. The politest thing they said was that I’d a head like a 50 pence coin.”
He added, “Well, it paid dividends today and I’ll need to give a DVD of the clearance out to the kids to show them how to do it.
“We had to use all our experience towards the end when it was backs-to-the-wall time. But we dug in and showed the kind of spirit we have at the club.”
Finally, a word on referee Stevie O’Reilly. Tynecastle can be an intimidating venue to officiate at with the crowd right on top of the playing surface, but O’Reilly stayed in control of a keenly-contested 90 minutes without flashing card after card and got most of the big decisions right.
He had no alternative but to book Morris and Mackay after the pair took turns in going right through the back of Elliot, was right in dismissing Anderson, spot on in cautioning Suso for diving in an effort to get Morris sent off and yellow carding Wallace for catching Taylor.