Craig Gordon says Hearts fought for everything as they overcame St. Mirren in a pulsating Round Five Scottish Cup tie at the SMiSA Stadium.
The goalkeeper was one of the heroes of the night as he made two vital saves from the spot to help the Jambos defeat the Buddies 4-2 on penalties when the game finished at 1-1 after extra time.
James Penrice hit the winning kick to put the men in maroon into the hat for the quarter finals of the competition, with Calem Nieuwenhof striking a late equaliser in normal time, with the captain pleased by Hearts’ determination on a grueling night.
“I’m not sure we can say safely through, but we've managed to get through a really difficult game,” he told Hearts TV.
“In the first half we were probably second-best right across the pitch and at times we're trying to hang on and get in at half-time and try and sort things out a little bit. It was really difficult, they (St. Mirren) do that here.
“They're a very difficult team to play against and we had to really scrap for everything. We got back into it and had a little bit more control in the second half, but again, it was still very scrappy. Delighted for Calem to come back into the team and get a vital goal for us.”
Scotland’s number one came up trumps in the penalty shoot-out, making two impressive stops to deny James Scott and Oisin Smyth from the spot.
Craig was especially pleased with the saves as he sailed uncharted waters – with St. Mirren’s regular penalty takers off the pitch by the time penalties unfolded – but said the backing of Hearts supporters behind the goal made the difference after the Jambos won the coin toss.
“I think they'd taken quite a few of their penalty takers off, so there wasn't a great deal to go on,” said Craig.
“We knew a couple of them that we thought might do that, but it was a little bit more guesswork than what you might think, just because they'd taken the more usual penalty takers off the pitch at that stage.
“That can sometimes happen when you get to a penalty shootout. It's not quite as easy as just knowing exactly where everybody's going to go, so it was a little bit of both. I was delighted when the coin toss came down and it was at our end. I thought that would be a big advantage.
“It was great. James got us off to a good start and then by managing to save the first one, the possibility of going two-nil up really put the pressure on.”
