Hearts are through to meet Celtic in the William Hills Scottish Cup semi-final after seeing off a determined St Mirren side in Paisley last night. The initial part of the game gave the impression to the neutral observer that the Buddies were the side which would progress. However, despite the pressure and the award of a penalty within the first 15 minutes of the game, they lacked the goal that their hard work deserved. It was typical that Hearts would score against the run of play and then score again in the second half to end St Mirren's hopes of heading to Hampden again. Jamie Hamill scored the first goal and the wind was taken out of the Buddies sails in the second half when Rudi Skacel scored the final goal of the game with four minutes to play. It could have been oh so different if Graham Carey had scored from the spot after Marius Zaliukas was penalised for hand ball just before Nigel Hasselbaink put the ball into the visitors net.
Hearts manager Paulo Sergio was pleased to have made it to the semi-final at the second attempt. He said: "It was a very good game. St Mirren started better and those first 15 minutes they were moving the ball very well. After that I think we took control of the game. We could have killed the game in the first half, but we didn't. I think we deserved victory. The boys worked very hard. We are all very, very happy to go to the semi-final."
His opposite number, Danny Lennon was disappointed referee Stevie O'Reilly did not delay his decision to blow for the penalty award. Lennon said: "I thought he was very, very quick to blow. They have this wee safety net, three to five seconds that they can let it go to see if there's any advantage to be gained - there certainly was. I've seen it (the replay) and from the ball hitting his (Zaliukas') hand and Nigel putting it in you're lucky if there's a second. But he made his decision and it was a fantastic save from the goalkeeper. In any game you do need that wee bit of luck and you do need breaks. We don't seem to be getting them at this moment in time. We've got to take a great bit of belief from a very, very good first half. But we've got nothing to show from it and it's a great opportunity missed."
Source: FOOTYMAD
