Kai Watson: Is it Hearts Title to Lose?
Hearts will sit top of the Scottish Premiership on Christmas Day as the Edinburgh side looks to break the long-standing Celtic and Rangers title dominance.
Free Bets' Scottish football expert Kai Watson assesses whether 2026 could be the year the Tynecastle club turn belief into silverware.
Heart of Midlothian will top the Scottish Premiership by six points come Christmas day, albeit Celtic have a game in hand. It’s impossible to say they don’t deserve it too as they have played brilliantly, at times, this season and ground out results when they had to.
They did recently have a spell of four games without a win, which included a disappointing 1-0 defeat at Pittodrie, their only league loss of the season so far. However, since conceding an injury time goal to Bruce Anderson, which rescued a point for Kilmarnock on December 3rd, they’ve been pretty much perfect.
Their next game after the Killie draw at Tynecastle was the toughest fixture this season, on paper, a trip to Parkhead to take on Wilfried Nancy’s Celtic. The home side had the better chances to start the game but Daizen Maeda couldn’t take advantage of two excellent opportunities at 0-0. Then up stepped Claudio Braga to give Hearts the lead not long before half-time then Oisin McEntee doubled the lead from a corner.
Celtic did get a consolation goal through Kieran Tierney but it wasn’t enough to stop Hearts taking all the points away. Next up was a tricky away trip to a Falkirk side who had surprised a lot of people this season but it only took Hearts two minutes to take the lead through Braga again. Aside from a controversial non-penalty call for Falkirk, Hearts were rather comfortable and doubled their lead through a Stephen Kingsley screamer with just over ten minutes left.
On paper, that was another tricky match, especially on a cold and wet Saturday evening, but Hearts, yet again, came away with all the points. Then came the statement game on Sunday, Hearts vs Rangers at Tynecastle, a chance for Hearts to either pull twelve points ahead, or for Rangers to take the gap to six with a game in hand. It was a game of monumental proportion but one that the home side would have felt confident going into.
Rangers had the better of the beginning of the game and thought they had taken the lead nine minutes in as Manny Fernandez header was cushioned in by Bojan Miovski at the far post. However, the Macedonian striker was adjudged to have been offside, although the lines that were drawn weren’t exactly conclusive.
Alexandros Kyziridis had a couple of decent efforts, one on his left and one on right that flashed just wide of the post before Mikey Moore’s deflected effort was saved by Schwolow and Jayden Meghoma’s follow up was deflected wide.
Hearts got a corner after a poor Jack Butland kick out then worked it well between Kyziridis and Braga before the Greek winger sent in a beautiful cross which was met by an equally impressive header by Stuart Findlay who was moving away from goal. The second came just a few minutes later as McEntee flicked on a header to Braga who then flicked it on to Shankland who, from what seemed like an impossible again, fired a half-volley through Butland at the near post.
An excellent strike but terrible goalkeeping, Shankland then missed a glorious chance from twelve yards out as he tried to cushion Kyziridis’ cut back into the corner but placed it just wide. Hearts should have scored more as they had plenty of counter attacks but Rangers had most of the possession and play in the second half.
In the last minute, a hoofed clearance from Thelo Aasgaard caused Frankie Kent some trouble as Youssef Chermiti chased him down and the Portuguese striker did well to beat him to the ball and slot it into the net, it was 2-1 but the game was over.
Hearts have done the double over Celtic and Rangers this season and even if both win their games in hand, Derek McInnes’ side will be three and nine points clear respectively. Hearts will look to Jamestown Analytics to further improve the squad in January, if those signings have the same success as the summer ones, is it Hearts title to lose?
Latest Scottish Premiership Betting Odds
Despite holding a six-point lead at the top of the table, Hearts are still priced as second favourites by the betting sites in the Scottish Premiership title race this season.
