Wouter nightmare<\/p>\n
Vrancken had urged Hearts to show guts in Graz. This was certainly a bit of a riot at times. But not in a good way.<\/p>\n
What he didn\u2019t bargain for was a horror start that saw them behind with little over three minutes on the clock. It was such a cheap goal and surely they had been warned of Mitchell\u2019s torpedo throw ins.<\/p>\n
Hearts looked wide open defensively and particularly at set pieces – the complete opposite of last season – and Sturm didn\u2019t need asked twice to take advantage. What the fans would have given for the rock solid Stuart Findlay – Craig Halkett partnership to clear anything that came their way in the air. Injury meant neither played a part although Findlay, on the bench, surely comes back in next week.<\/p>\n
Vrancken is all about passing forward at pace and causing chaos for opposition. Hearts did move the ball well at times. The worry was that most the chaos was in their defence. Early days of course. But if this is risk and reward football then there was plenty of the former with absolutely none of the latter.<\/p>\n
What a waste<\/p>\n
The sooner Amadou Ba-Sy is fit and firing the better for Hearts. You can\u2019t waste as many good chances as they did and expect to progress at this level. Kabore put the legwork in up top but remains unreliable in front of goal. Two first half efforts were wasted and his decision making was questionable at best. He wasn\u2019t the only one. Kyziridis missed a sitter to level midway through the first half too. Three chances you\u2019d expect a certain Lawrence Shankland to bury last season.<\/p>\n
Ba-Sy looked like he has the killer instinct in front of goal in a 45 minute run out against Rayo Vallecano on Friday and the Frenchman seems the best option to lead the line right now.<\/p>\n
Tried but hardly trusted<\/p>\n
Only two of Hearts\u2019 10 new summer signings started Vrancken\u2019s first game in charge. It suggests most are still getting up to speed but Malachi Fagan-Walcott was handed a debut beside Jamie McCart in defence while Calvin Miller started on the right wing. There wasn\u2019t much Euro experience in the Jambos ranks never mind Champions League.<\/p>\n
Fagan-Walcott looked, at times, like a player who has just made the giant leap from National League to Champions League. Dragged about by the lively Graz forwards he clearly needs time to build relationships at the back. Miller was quiet by his own standards, albeit against a tidy Sturm left flank.<\/p>\n
Level down<\/p>\n
Sturm are hardly a Champions League regular but they were levels above Hearts in almost every area. Clinical in front of goal and solid enough at the back. Dangerous in the wide areas and deadly from set pieces. Hearts will drop in the Europa League now but with either Benfica or St Gallen lying in wait the challenge doesn\u2019t get any easier. Vrancken needs to find a rapid formula that works or Hearts could find themselves tumbling out of Europe altogether even if they have three bites of the cherry.<\/p>\n
Sturm warning<\/p>\n
The Austrians are a big unit. Much like when they overpowered Rangers here in the Europa League last season they weren\u2019t scared to go long with 6ft 3in Szymon Wlodarczyk leading the charge up top.<\/p>\n
When they did get the ball down they moved it quick and there was plenty of talent on show. Strong running Jatta is a threat when he has space in front of him. Hodl dovetailed brilliantly with full back Emra Soglo on the left. And then there\u2019s star man Kiteishvili who took no time to provide impact off the bench with the assist for the second goal.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Wouter nightmare Vrancken had urged Hearts to show guts in Graz. This was certainly a bit of a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":704063,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[1669,2600,11400,59,9531,233591,8058,101,56,54,55,233590],"class_list":["post-704062","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-champions-league","tag-europa-league","tag-footballblog","tag-gb","tag-hearts-fc","tag-jamestown-analytics","tag-scottish-premiership","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom","tag-wouter-vrancken"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/704062","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=704062"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/704062\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/704063"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=704062"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=704062"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=704062"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}