Hearts

McInnes says he hopes Findlay and captain Lawrence Shankland, who has been missing since 17 January with a hamstring injury, will be back for the final pre-split game against Motherwell on 11 April.

Another key figure, midfielder Cammy Devlin, is due back in “two or three weeks” according to McInnes, as is defender Stephen Kingsley.

Hearts are four points clear of Rangers at the top of the Premiership.

“As it stands we had 11 players unavailable to train today, but we’ve still got enough to train and put a strong team out and a strong squad out on Saturday,” McInnes said.

“So my focus is the ones that are available, and just trying to get one or two who are in the 50-50 category available for the weekend.

“It’s easy to feel sorry for yourself, easy to think: ‘why us? why me?’ But it’s unrealistic to go through a full campaign [without injuries].

“It’s a league for as reason, you have to go through these different tests and challenges.

“There’s no doubt we’re getting challenged at the minute. Once we get through the next four games we will ideally be a bit stronger going into the final run in.

“It will almost feel like a transfer window opening up in April. So you’ve got to take the good with the bad.”

Midfielder McEntee went to see a specialist on Wednesday morning for a shoulder issue after a scan revealed “fairly positive” news.

Baningime has some bruising on his lower leg and McInnes says the midfielder is hopeful he can train on Friday and feature at Tynecastle against Aberdeen.

Kerjota, meanwhile, picked up a hip strain in a closed door friendly against Dundee on Tuesday but may well be fit to play too.

The late goals are not the only habit that Hearts are forming. Winning the hard way, getting maximum points from a bare minimum performance, is something that title-winning teams do too.

“If you want to challenge for titles and win leagues, you have to win ugly, and Hearts did that tonight,” former Celtic defender Charlie Mulgrew told Premier Sports.

He was not the only pundit to comment on Hearts’ below-par performance. While McInnes named an attacking side, they looked timid in the build up, struggling to stay calm in the typical chaos of an Edinburgh derby.

“They’ll not really care about the performance, they’ve got 12 games to create history,” former Hearts midfielder Ryan Stevenson, who also had a hard job picking a man of the match, told BBC Sportsound.

“Harry Milne, for me, he tried everything he possible could to affect the game, to drive Hearts forward. Other than him, pretty much all of them were stinking.”

Well, quite. Scott Allan, the former Hibs and Celtic midfielder, was a bit more eloquent in his assessment.

“Tonight was such a big game and to not play well at all… I couldn’t see Hearts scoring a goal, I thought there was only going to be one winner and it was Hibs,” he reflected.

“To win like that, clean sheet as well, it says so much about what you’re building in there.

“Derek McInnes will not be worried about that performance. What a position that puts Hearts into, going into that game on Sunday.”

Ah yes, the game on Sunday. Rangers at Ibrox. Hearts won there back in September, their first victory away to the blue half of Glasgow since 2014.

No-one could have imagined then that, the next time Hearts came to town, the visitors would still have a lead over their hosts in the standings.

“If they get three points at Ibrox, I think they’ll win the league,” Stevenson predicted. A big call for a big game.