Dundee United 3 - 0 Hearts: Hearts made to pay by lively United for performance hitch

MONEY doesn't buy happiness. The Hearts players learned that lesson yesterday. Twenty-four hours after finally getting their wages, the Tynecastle side turned in one of their poorest performances of the season to ensure that payment won't be followed up with a win bonus. And Eggert Jonsson can probably expect a fine, too, after being sent off in the 74th minute.

Against a Dundee United side with the wherewithal to trouble them time and again with balls pinged in from the flanks and the necessary precision to punish them from set-pieces, Hearts were always onto a beating and can thank the woodwork and some fine goalkeeping from Marian Kello for ensuring the final score was not more embarrassing.

"I'm not happy with the result but we must accept and learn from this," said Hearts manager Csaba Laszlo. But he refused to blame the financial uncertainty of the past couple of weeks for the under-par performance. "I think if you are on the field, you don't think about this. You are a sportsman and want to win games and if the ball comes in and you don't header it, that is because you are not doing your job, not because you are thinking about other issues."

And Kello undermined any notion that the team were not mentally attuned. "I was thinking about my work, not thinking about money. The players don't think about money." His performance suggested that he at least was focused.

By the time half-time arrived he had already had to pull off a couple of important saves and, along with the woodwork, was responsible for keeping the scoreline respectable. But he couldn't do anything about the opener.

It was no surprise that Craig Conway was the man who netted it. He had been a nuisance all game and by the 25th minute the Hearts rearguard had been well and truly warned about the dangers he posed from a set piece. But this time, if fairness, there was little they could do to stop it. From 25 yards out, Scott Roberston, who is emerging as one of Craig Levein's best buys yet, touched the ball to his team-mate and Conway leathered it past the rooted Kello.

United were the team many pundits tipped as third-place finishers as the season got under way. Instead they have stuttered into the campaign and it is Hearts who have set the pace as best of the rest. That claim was questioned yesterday and it should be an interesting tussle in the months that lie ahead. Last night only five points seperated third place from second bottom.

The last time the teams had met at Tannadice there had been five goals and three sendings off, with United dominating the goals and the visitors responsible for the red cards. From the early signs this one had the makings a similarly engrossing encounter.

Hearts were under the cosh and even in open play the balls whipped in from wide were a cause of constant consternation in the away ranks. Neither Laryea Kingston nor Jonsson could contain Conway and it was his delivery from yet another free-kick which found Jon Daly in the 34th minute but again Kello was alert enough to push it onto the roof of the net.

Hearts weren't exactly pegged into their own half but with the midfielders occupied by the more effective United players in that department there was nothing up front to bother the home defence and time and again Hearts' ventures upfield proved impotent.

In the 40th minute, the visitors finally gave Craig Levein's men a taste of their own medicine when Audrius Ksanavicius swirled in a free-kick. Christos Karipidis got on the end of it he couldn't get it beyond Lukasz Zaluska. At the other end Morgano Gomis had an attempt from 30 yards out and only the woodwork could deny the home side. The second half started with Saulius Mikoliunas skipping into the United box. With others attempting to play the Hearts man offside, it was left to Lee Wilkie to get back and block.

But if they addressed the problem of getting players into the United area at half-time, Hearts had not come up with a solution to United's greater verve and were still unable to nullify the threat from the flanks and in the 50th minute United took a two-goal advantage, when Flood's delivery was headed past Kello by Daly, whose celebrations befitted the fact he became a new father this week.

In the 55th minute, Jonsson, out of ideas when it came to halting Conway, fouled the effervescent attacker. It earned him a booking and while United failed to make anything from the set piece, the tackle was to come back and haunt the Icelandic defender. Up against the same player in the 74th minute, he again resorted to illegal means and was dispatched for his second yellow card.

By then there was no way back for Hearts. They had conceded a third when Scott Robertson finished off a Conway free-kick and were being completely out-played by a United side displaying the ideas and finishing Levein had always said they were capable of.

Hearts put on Christian Nade and Mike Tullberg in a vain shot at a fightback but the best they could muster was a a Mikoliunas shot which pinged back off the post. On this evidence, the battle for the title of best of the rest is back on.

OVERVIEW

MAN OF THE MATCH

Dundee United's former Ayr player Craig Conway scored and set up the Tangerines' goals and was a source of so much for United, while riling the Hearts ranks. His 25-yard free kick in the first half was the catalyst for his side's march towards victory over their visitors from the capital.

QUICK FACT

Having secured their first win of the season at Pittodrie last week, United went into this one seeking a win at home. They duly delivered it to their fans with a clinical display against a Hearts side that failed to live up to the high benchmark it had set themselves in previous weeks.

TALKING POINT

All week the talking point surrounding the Tynecastle club had been the non-payment of wages to staff and players alike. Even with the money put into the players' accounts before yesterday's game, they didn't look like they could buy a win, slipping to their third defeat of the season.