Lawrence Shankland demands Hearts naivety cut out as he warns Dundee errors at PAOK could spell European trouble

Frustrated skipper Lawrence Shankland knows Hearts showed naivety at Dundee and can’t be as green in Greece - if they are to have any chance of rescuing their Europa Conference League dream.

The Jambos lost 1-0 at Dens Park and it was to a goal of their own undoing, as Zander Clark took a needless short free-kick and then Kye Rowles put Aiden Denholm under pressure with a pass that saw him get robbed and Luke McCowan netted the winner. Teenager Denholm was the fall-guy but Shankland knows the more experienced players around him in the team were just as culpable and shouldn’t have put him in that position.

“Naivety’s the word that sums it up,” Shankland stated. We give away a cheap goal and throw away the points. At the start of the second half the momentum was totally with us, we created a couple of openings and looked like the team more likely to score – but then we gave them that goal out of nothing. We’ve discussed it plenty of times before, it’s just pure naivety. Obviously young Aidan Denholm makes a mistake, but there are three senior pros around him who could have told him just to go long.

“It’s so frustrating. I’ve said exactly these things in the dressing room, that it’s just daft, that we’re experienced boys who can’t be making mistakes like these. We all know when we’re playing well and when we’re not, when to try things and when not to.

“But at the goal, Zander’s well out of his goals and we try a couple of passes and next thing they’re basically got an open goal. If I’ve come up here, we’ve not played well but we’ve come away with a point, I’d be saying that’s fair enough.

“We need to be a team who knows that if we don’t play well, we still don’t lose. But too many times last season and again now,