Levein rues ‘sloppy’ finish from Lafferty after Killie draw



Posted Wednesday, February 28, 2018 by PA

Levein rues ‘sloppy’ finish from Lafferty after Killie draw

Hearts manager Craig Levein felt Kyle Lafferty’s “sloppy” stoppage-time penalty miss summed up his display in a 1-1 draw with Kilmarnock.

Jamie MacDonald dived low to his left and held Lafferty’s effort after the Northern Ireland international had been tripped by Youssouf Mulumbu.

Levein said: “Kyle’s penalty kind of summed up his performance. He did some good things, but I thought he was off it a bit.

“He’s been really good for us but he wasn’t at his best. His penalty attempt was quite sloppy and hit with hope rather than any real determination.

“I can’t be too critical as he’s our top scorer and has bailed us out on many occasions. Even if you forget about his penalty, it was far from his best performance.”

Levein’s “biggest gripe” was his side’s poor start. Eamonn Brophy held off Christophe Berra to net after Mulumbu’s hopeful ball forward but Steven Naismith headed his first Hearts goal in the 27th minute from David Milinkovic’s cross.

The Hearts boss added: “We worked really hard during the week to get the ball wide quickly and we didn’t really do that.

“I looked at some of the footage at half-time and on the one occasion we did get the ball wide and then put it into the box, Naisy scores.

“That was frustrating, it’s frustrating the way we dominated the game for long spells and didn’t manage to carve Kilmarnock open on as many occasions as I would have liked.”

Killie manager Steve Clarke felt a late goal against his side would have been unjust after they finished the game strongly, Jordan Jones being denied by a fingertip save by Jon McLaughlin.

After a snowy night at Tynecastle, Clarke said: “Credit to both teams, they tried to play. The surface wasn’t the best, a lot of people slipping and falling over.

“Both goals you could probably put down to the pitch a little bit. Big Berra struggled a little bit with the high ball in behind him and Brophy got in front of him. We know when he gets there he can score.

“Their goal was a catalogue of errors, there was a slip in the middle of the park, two of my players collided, we gave the ball away on the edge of the box and then Stephen O’Donnell was in a great position to defend the cross and slipped.”

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