Caley Thistle 1 Hearts 1

By EWAN SMITH

HE'S taken away their day off and is in no mood to give it back.

On the evidence of this sloppy performance, Hearts boss Paulo Sergio is RIGHT to keep his side behind at Riccarton for extra homework.

The hardy souls who spent hard-earned cash on a 250-mile round trip from Edinburgh to Inverness work all week for a Saturday.

The least they can expect is for their heroes to work all week themselves to make Saturday special.

This was anything but. In fact, at times you could have been forgiven for thinking they were making up for losing Wednesday off by having a fly half-day.

In Danny Grainger and Jamie Hamill they have wing-backs with real guile and drive.

In Andy Webster and Maruis Zaliukas they've the makings of a solid defence.

David Templeton gives them that touch of the unexpected in attack and Stephen Elliott scored a poacher's equaliser.

Even keeper Jamie MacDonald — who slipped to gift Inverness a deserved opener — tried to make amends with a string of fine saves.

Unless Hearts can get it together on the training ground, there are still no guarantees they can can challenge as the third force.

Hence the need for a further warning from Sergio that slacking is not an option.

He said: "Everybody works for eight hours a day so why can't a football player work for at least two hours every

day? They say they have to rest on Wednesday, I don't believe that. I don't want to say that what I'm doing is better than others, it's just what I believe in.

"If you want to improve you have to practise, you have to be with the ball.

"If you play on a Saturday and stay home to recover, when you come in on Monday you don't do much. Then you work on a Tuesday and recover on a Wednesday, big deal.

"You work on a Thursday so does that mean you only work on a Tuesday and a Thursday? I don't believe in this."

Like Hearts, Caley Jags staggered through an uneventful 45 minutes to leave the fans wondering if they'd ever get out of first gear.

They went into overdrive after the break and deserved their opener, albeit at the expense of MacDonald. The keeper won't want to see replays of himself slipping on the turf to be robbed by Nick Ross.

Ross cut the ball back for Gregory Tade who drilled the ball into an empty net from 20 yards.

Hearts hit the bar through Templeton's curling drive before Tade missed two great chances to seal the win.

MacDonald twice blocked from Tade as he broke clear and those saves were pivotal in allowing Elliot to toe-poke in a Templeton cross on 81 minutes to earn Hearts a share of the spoils.

It was cruel to Inverness but they have much to be positive about, not least the emergence of David Davis who made an impressive debut for them after joining on a deadline-day loan from Wolves.

He said: "The SPL is a tough league and has teams like Rangers and Celtic.

"It's not just about them. There are good players in every team and it's down to me to come here and make an impact.

"I will get a lot of exposure up here if I do well. If I do the manager at Wolves will hear about it.

"But I'm not here as a stepping stone. I'm here to give 110 per cent every week and as long as I'm in the team I'll do that."