Hearts boss Steven Naismith on what to expect from Rangers

Here's everything the head coach had to say:

What’s the message been this week after the disappointment at the weekend?

We’ve looked over the goals and I think the biggest aspect is that we need to be much tighter defensively, we can’t give up opportunities like that. Last week’s game and this week’s game are similar in that you’ll be punished more times than you’re not in those situations. Last week’s game was different to maybe the previous three games in that we were not good in possession, poor out of possession and that cost us against the best team in the league. If we tidy up on our general play, that will give us a better opportunity.

Does this game tell you a lot about the players and show they can learn from their mistakes?

Definitely. I think that has been the process this season at times, in games we’ve lost sloppy goals we’ve gone on and built a decent run of performances, taking away results. In the past it has shown we have learned our lesson but this will be a big test as for me that was our most disappointing performance.

READ MORE: Naismith provides injury updates on Gordon, Halkett, Tagawa and Kingsley

It’s a busy week coming up, are you keeping one eye on the immediate future as well?

You reference it and you understand it’s busy and it’s a condensed period. What you have at the end of it, in terms of your points in the league and you could also be in the final of a competition - it’s an intense, busy time but it’s a good opportunity for us as a group and for the players individually that they’ll inevitably want to be playing in these games.

The players will know jerseys are at stake for the semi-final at Hampden?

They are, yes, but also for the Livi game. We’re now at the point where we’re getting a couple of the injuries back and the selection in certain positions… there is more competition for places, which we’ve not had in the last month, six weeks. With it being a busy period and the time of games they are, it’s definitely an opportunity for people to stake a claim to be playing.

How is Craig Gordon doing? Is he close to a return?

I would not want to put an exact on it but Craig and Halkett are now at the stage of just building up, it’s a period of two, three, four weeks that they are consistently training and getting minutes. Then we’ll look at, ‘right they’ve got through that’, we can say they are potentially ready to be involved in a squad. There are so many variations within that, especially for the goalie, games are probably much more important than training for Craig because, ‘how is he going to be with a cross ball coming in, or diving out at someone’s feet?’. Whereas in training there is caution there. That’s that and Craig Halkett has come into the group and looked really good but again players when they’ve been out for a long time, they start off with a real high then it’s adapting after that. They two are still a bit away.

Craig Gordon played on Thursday afternoon?

He’s playing in a bounce game against Rangers, it’s another game and we need to keep getting him games.

It must be a big thing having the two of them back in the group, given their experience and leadership qualities?

The two of them being back on the training pitch, you can feel it, you can hear it when you’re doing training. The voices that are there, it’s just instructions. Minimum you are passing on instructions and then the other part of it is they are setting standards so that definitely does make a difference and it helps.

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Rangers have a new manager, are you confident that you know what to expect from them?

They had the game last week at home, which helps as you imagine they will be pretty similar. They’ve got the game tonight and we’ll see what we can take from that. But just like we don’t know much about them it’s a short period of time for the manager to be in. As he’s said, he’s not going to change every part of the team or the structure of what they’re doing, we’ve watched them and have an understanding of what we want to do. In general, we need to defend better than what we did last week, especially against better teams that when we’ve got the ball, we’re in control, we decide what is happening. It’s not rushed and we're not just kicking it out the park and deciding we’re going to defend for 90 minutes because you are setting yourself up for failure.