HEARTS caretaker boss Jon Daly, in charge after Robbie Neilson’s move to MK Dons, praised his players after the 2-2 draw with Ross County in Dingwall yesterday.
Going behind to a Jay McEveley strike, the Tynecastle men replied with second-half goals from Arnaud Djoum and Callum Paterson, before Liam Boyce equalised with a penalty-kick.
Deep into stoppage time, Jamie Walker was brought down in the box, but his spot-kick was saved by Scott Fox.
Daly said: “I thought we looked a bit lethargic in the first-half. But that’s to be expected. We’ve put everything into the past two games and there wasn’t much in this one, so we were a bit unfortunate to be a goal down.“We knew how County would play and we didn’t deal with balls into the box.

“The boys are running on empty now after the last seven days, but they’ve been superb all week and we couldn’t ask for more. A penalty miss can happen.”Daly, coach of the Jambos Under-20s outfit, took time to hail the work done by departing duo Neilson and Stevie Crawford.

He added: “You have to credit Robbie and Stevie. They’ve left a great squad with strength in depth, and the new head coach can call in top class players on the bench.
“The new head coach will be pleasantly surprised with just how good this squad is.”
Meanwhile, Watford have joined Derby in pursuit of Hearts’ international right-back Paterson who put in another solid performance in the Highlands.