Wouter Vrancken admits Hearts killed themselves as his Jambos reign started with a 4-0 thumping against Sturm Graz, writes Fraser Wilson in Austria.
But the Belgian insists the Champions League qualifier is NOT over.
Set plays and nervousness cost Hearts
A fourth minute header from Jon Stankovic and three goals in nine minutes after the break from Jeyland Mitchell, Luca Weinhandl and Jurgen Heil blew Hearts away as a combination of ropey defending and wasteful finishing cost the Tynecastle side dearly.
And Vrancken said: “It’s a difficult game when you lose 4–0. In general, when you don't kill, you get killed.
“But when I see the first half, set play, it's difficult to accept such a goal in such a game.
“But the rest was good. We played good football, we created a lot of chances.
“But at this level, you have to score the goals, you have to finish the chances also.
“At half-time, I was really confident that we could still turn it around because of the first half we played. And then they come out and you get again the same thing.
“And that messes up your whole game actually. And then we tried to do stuff that we normally don't want to do, like too many touches and stuff to do good. But at the same moment, you do bad and you get smacked like this.
“But when I see the game and analyse the game shortly after the game, the quality wasn't that much different. The score is too much. But yeah, this is what it is now.
“I think we pulled it on ourselves because of the set plays. Because otherwise, you could still play your game, go for it, like we did actually in the first half.
“But after the second goal, you felt also the players were a little bit more nervous and we had to keep the speed in the game.”
Vrancken refuses to give up
Hearts now look destined to tumble into the Europa League qualifiers where they will face Benfica or St Gallen.
But Vrancken is not giving up on a miracle in Gorgie next Tuesday night.
Asked if the tie was over he said: “I think it's still sport, it's still football.
“You cannot accept just and go over like a friendly, especially when it's at Tynecastle, when we go with the crowd behind.
“We can finish it, we can be more efficient than we've been today, and in football everything is sport.
“What did I learn? I think we have to learn to stay emotionally stable when you get behind.
“It's very important that you keep the overview, that you do the good things.
“I was pretty sure that after the first half, when we came back in the game, we could just play like this and keep playing like this, creating these chances that we could score and then everything was possible.
“But again, the second goal killed this in your head as a player. It killed this vibe.”
