If Rangers are praying for Kemar Roofe to recover in time for two massive fixtures next week, our Scottish Cup rivals Hearts are in a similar situation in that they have their own injury issues at the other end of the park.
In Craig Halkett and John Souttar, their first choice centre-halves have been missing in recent weeks and have just returned to Robbie Neilson’s squad, however, as reported by the Edinburgh Evening News, the Hearts boss has revealed that they might not be 100% fit for Hampden:
“Tomorrow we’ll have McEneff, Smith, Devlin and Halliday, plus Souttar will be on the bench. He won’t play but he’ll be available for Saturday.
“The hope for Halkett is Saturday, too. Apart from Beni Baningime, they will all be available for some sort of a game on Saturday.”
It would be an interesting call if Neilson throws Souttar back into action in a cup final against the team he is about to join, even if he is their best defender and was named in the PFA Scotland team of the season, if he doesn’t come off the bench this weekend then I doubt that he will play.
The capital outfit have been able to coast in recent weeks given their league position and lead to fourth place and it’s an injury list that will have disrupted their plans for the Scottish Cup.
Any advantage they have due to us playing in the Europa League final will be negated by the match fitness of their own key players, Saturday’s league game would normally be seen as a dress rehearsal, however, for very differing reasons, I don’t think either side will be even remotely similar to what we see at Hampden a week later.