Derek McInnes hails Hearts for dragging themselves off canvas to beat Motherwell

Hearts manager Derek McInnes hailed his William Hill Premiership leaders for ‘dragging themselves off the canvas’ after two late goals earned them their first victory over Motherwell this season at a crucial time.

Lawrence Shankland’s 87th-minute penalty put Hearts ahead and substitute Landry Kabore netted on the break in stoppage time to seal a 3-1 victory.

Emmanuel Longelo had put the visitors ahead in the 50th minute and they squandered several good chances before and after Claudio Braga levelled.

McInnes said: “There’s no two ways about it – we were under the cosh. But I still felt quite calm in the sense I thought we would score. We very rarely don’t score, particularly here at Tynecastle.

“Thankfully Braga comes up with a big moment. The reaction of the players is magnificent. It’s exactly what you want. Nobody’s settling for a draw. To be fair, neither were Motherwell.

“I thought it was a very good game. There was a lot of drama, none more so than the penalty-kick. I haven’t seen it again but what I’ve been told, even a couple of the Motherwell lads have said to me, he’s kicked him in the head. So it’s a penalty. Very rarely you get kicked in the head and it’s not a penalty.

“But we take advantage of it, Lawrence, great temperament, tucks it away brilliantly.”

Motherwell looked certain to go back in front when Premiership top goalscorer Tawanda Maswanhise brilliantly beat two Hearts defenders, only to drag his finish wide.

McInnes said: “Motherwell are not an easy team to play against. They’re not an easy team to score three goals against. We’ve managed to do it twice now but we’ve had to dig deep to do that.

“They are a team that test your organisation. Fifty per cent of my starting 11 have not been playing and it was always a worry for me because you need energy, you need fitness, you need that sharpness to deal with Motherwell.

“It says so much about them that they found something just to drag themselves off the canvas again and get the win.”

Motherwell manager Jens Berthel Askou was again left frustrated by a key decision as he labelled Matthew Macdermid’s VAR-assisted penalty award “very soft”.

Stephen Welsh was penalised for catching Kabore on the head while trying to clear after the Hearts sub had headed the ball while on the ground.

Askou questioned what Welsh could have done while Kabore was “dribbling with his head”.

“It’s a shame for the game that it gets decided like that,” he said. “You can argue every time there’s contact that there’s a foul. Then it’s about the amount of contact, the speed of contact, the situation.”

The Dane added: “But what I want to underline again is that I’m really, really proud of our performance.

“We took control of a very difficult game against a very good team who are really, really good at what they do, who have an atmosphere that really drives them and can get you emotionally unstable if you’re not there. We dealt with that extremely well.

“Some of the play we set up in the second half, leading to our chances, also the goal, was absolutely outstanding.”