JAMBOS WIN MARRED BY DOUBLE INJURY BLOW

HEARTS' comprehensive victory over Alloa came at a price - with two of their stars facing injury lay-offs.

Bosnian midfielder Mirsad Beslija was taken off with a suspected dislocated jaw and Greek defender Christos Karipidis will undergo a scan on a knee problem.

That news will add to the woes of under-fire Hearts coach Valdas Ivanauskas, although last night the Lithuanian's main emotion was relief his men got the job done against the Second Division side.

Ivanauskas also revealed hat-trick hero Juho Makela could find himself relegated to the bench for Sunday's game at Aberdeen. He said: "I was relieved just to get through this tie as it was not an easy game and the score was 0-0 for a while.

"The players worked hard and scored good goals. I was happy with how seriously the players took the game, they understood the situation.

"It's a good result - it's positive to score four goals. Juho Makela did well and he scored a decent hat-trick. It is good for a striker's self-confidence to score goals.

"Juho did well but we have to look and see who is playing on Sunday."

Alloa boss Allan Maitland said: "We were beaten by the better side - it's as simple as that.

"Hearts have a lot of quality in their ranks and we competed well.

It's hard enough playing against an SPL side when you're 1-0 down but to go two down so quickly was tough to take.

"I told them to start the second half brightly but within seconds we were 2-0 down.

"I thought the referee was a little bit harsh in sending off Chris Townsley. And then third goal just killed us stone dead."

Taken from the Daily Record