Stephen Kingsley on the recurring Rangers problem that cost Hearts

Five times the two clubs have met this season; five times Hearts have finished the game with nothing to show for their efforts. The Ibrox club remain the only domestic opponent Naismith is still to register a win against, and that unhappy record continued on Sunday as Rangers progressed to the Scottish Cup final courtesy of a 2-0 victory at Hampden.

The loss was a painful one for Stephen Kingsley and his team-mates. In the build-up to the semi-final, the squad had discussed the importance of keeping Rangers at bay during the game’s opening exchanges. Keep it tight early on, the thinking went, and that will provide a foothold in the match from which Hearts can build. But it didn’t happen.

Cyriel Dessers took advantage of some slack defending to give Rangers the lead inside the opening five minutes, and the striker grabbed his second of the afternoon via a well-executed counter-attack with 15 minutes to go to all but seal the win for Clement’s side. It was the worst possible start for Hearts – and Kingsley admits that the men in maroon were masters of their own downfall in Mount Florida.

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“I thought we were well in the game,” Kingsley said. “It was a disappointing first five minutes with the goal we conceded. We’ve talked about that before, about starting strong. So extremely disappointed to have lost that goal in the manner we did. But I thought we reacted to it really well and, as I said, we were in the game for, I thought, the rest of it.

“Obviously, we are starting to chase it towards the end and they grab a second which was a bit of a killer on the counter attack. We gave the ball away needlessly in the middle of the pitch.

“I think we did it a couple of times and got found out a couple of times, but that time they punished us and it was really a kick in the teeth because I thought we were in it until that point. And the last 10 minutes was scrapping trying to get something out of it and keeping in the game, but it wasn’t to be.”

This was the second time this season that Hearts were dumped out of a domestic cup by Rangers at the national stadium. November’s 3-1 defeat in the League Cup semi-final was equally dispiriting for fans of the Gorgie club, which begs the question: do Hearts have a problem performing on the big stage?

“I don’t think it is the occasion,” Kingsley said. “We have played on the big occasions before and we have won on big occasions before. When we’ve played Rangers, we have been guilty of not starting right and the start of a game, especially on a big occasion like this one was, you need to be strong, you need to be resolute.

“You cannot give them any confidence, whatsoever. They had come off the back of two poor results for their standards, so we need to start strong. We need to be resolute defensively. Not give them an inch, not give them a chance. Take away that momentum their crowd will give them and build from that. But we haven’t done that.

“I feel like in every game we have played them when we’ve been beaten, I feel that’s been the issue. We have not started the way we should have and, when you go 1-0 or 2-0 down, you are giving yourself a mountain to climb.

“Everyone is disappointed with themselves. We have talked about it and, yeah, we are completely disappointed. You are in there [the dressing room] and the atmosphere is not nice. It’s not where you want to be when you are coming to the big occasion and you feel like you are good enough to go and get a result and it is very disappointing.

“To be fair to the boys, I felt, apart from the goals, we were always in the game. In fact, I thought actually we were maybe the better team at times. Maybe not in terms of possession or breaking them down, but getting into their half, maintaining the attacks we had, camping them in at times, especially in the second half. So it is disappointing to concede that early goal and not to give ourselves a foothold in the game.”

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The defeat will sting but once the dust settles, Kingsley is confident that he and his team-mates will learn from it. The final result didn’t fall Hearts’ way but the game did provide valuable experience for some of the younger members of Naismith’s squad – and Kingsley is adamant that that can only be a good thing.

“We are a young team,” Kingsley observed. “I’m sure I heard Naisy say in the press the other day we are the second-youngest in the league. We are a team that will only get better with experience. We have got Europe, hopefully, coming up next season if we manage to maintain our form in the league and get third wrapped up.

“This is all good stuff for the young boys, as well as a couple of the older heads to drive us forward and to improve game after game, season after season and try to be in that position where we are making finals and taking our chances and winning cups. That’s the goal. So days like [Sunday] are disappointing, but we need to build on it and we need to take the positives.

“Even looking at Macaulay Tait coming on. He found it difficult coming into a game of that magnitude at that pace when we were down. But what an experience that is for the boy, though. Coming onto a game like that on that stage. That’s only going to serve him well and stand him in good stead going forward.

“So, we’re devastated obviously, everyone is as you can imagine. But we’ll use it and take the positives from it because there were positives. We know that. It is going to be sore for the next wee while, but we’ll learn from it.”