Neil Critchley swerves the buzzwords and bulls*** as something Hearts boss did after Killie won me over - Ryan Stevenson

It might sound daft after Hearts lost to Kilmarnock and are sitting rock bottom of the league. But I actually feel even more positive about the future of the side under Neil Critchley.

I was sceptical about his appointment, mainly down to this talk about algorithms, as I feared we might be landed with one of these coaches that are all buzzwords and BS. But Critchley has quickly won me over – and not just because of the immediate results. You can often get a new manager bounce but it was the way he went about it that impressed me. He spoke so well about the need to win the battles first then play – and Hearts did that against St Mirren, Omonia then getting the point at Hibs.

He went with two up front – which I loved – and spoke about playing the “Hearts way”. But there was a bit of me that wanted to see how he responded to his first setback. And we got the answers on Wednesday night. It was a real reality check for Critchley against Kilmarnock – and the response from him was spot-on.

There was no sugar-coating, no mealy-mouthed protecting of the players. He called it as he saw it – and that was exactly what I wanted to hear. He admitted the defending wasn’t good enough and it might not have done any harm in the short term seeing it for himself.

The defending hasn’t been good enough all season. We know there’s issues with scoring goals but first and foremost the manager will have to make Hearts hard to beat.

Right now they are far too easy to play against. That is something he’ll need to change but it’s also down to the players.

They need to want to do the dirty stuff, the simple things that can make life difficult for teams in this league.

Killie were the perfect league test for him. The Rugby Park side might have