Omonoia were hit twice early, and could never recover in a 2-0 loss away to Heart of Midlothian in UEFA Conference League action in Edinburgh. Early goals from Alan Forrest and Blair Spittal had Omonoia chasing the game for most of the night. Hearts were also fueled by a recent managerial change, Neil Critchley had taken over just over a week ago. Omonoia after winning their opener at home, lose their first away fixture. Their next Conference League match will also be away, in Belgium as they visit Gent, a side they are familiar with. Omonoia visited Hearts at Tynecastle Park in Edinburgh. This was Omonoia’s first ever trip to Scotland, and first time facing any Scottish opposition at all. Hearts struck first, and it was a bit of bad luck for Omonoia. Kenneth Vargas found Blair Spittal in space. Spittal let fly from outside the box, the initial attempt was blocked by Senou Coulibaly, but it took a fortuitous bounce for Hearts, and right to Alan Forrest, who made no mistake, hitting the target with a helpless Fabiano still sprawling across, to make it 1-0 for the home side in the 16th minute. The next blow wasn’t far behind. Just seven minutes later, a simple throw-in from Adam Forrester to the Hearts Captain, Lawrence Shankland created it. Shankland chested the ball well, and then made a very nifty back heeled pass to Spittal, who with an abundance of space and time had all day to decide where to put it past Fabiano, and made it 2-0. Omonoia started to find their legs after that, but the closest they came to getting on the board were two off-target headers from Filip Helander. Instead, it was Hearts who nearly made it 3-0, and they would have if not for Coulibaly blocking a shot off the boot of Shankland, who had Fabiano beat. This limited the damage to a 2-0 halftime advantage for the hosts. It was a fairly benign second half. Another header from Helander missed the target, and 41 year old Craig Gordon, the Hearts goalkeeper came flying out of his box to break up a potential breakaway for Andronikos Kakoullis. Omonoia finally did come close to scoring when Amine Khammas did well to spot Saidou Alioum going to the net, but he hit the post. The rebound came to Giannis Masouras, who put it wide. Then it looked like Hearts had scored again through James Penrice, but the goal was called back as Shankland was offside. The final score was 2-0 for Hearts. Hearts(Neil Critchley): 1. Craig Gordon(GK), 35. Adam Forrester(’63 5. Daniel Oyegoke), 2. Frankie Kent, 15. Kye Rowles, 3. Stephen Kingsley(’83 10. Barrie McKay), 17. Alan Forrest(’73 29. James Penrice), 18. Malachi Boateng, 14. Cameron Devlin, 16. Blair Spittal(’73 20. Yan Dhanda), 9. Lawrence Shankland(Captain), 77. Kenneth Vargas(’64 7. Jorge Grant) Omonoia(Valdas Dambrauskas): 40. Fabiano(GK, Captain), 24. Amine Khammas(’83 3. Fotis Kitsos), 4. Filip Helander, 5. Senou Coulibaly, 2. Alpha Diounkou(’68 17. Giannis Masouras), 80. Novica Erakovic, 20. Mateo Maric, 76. Charalambos Charalambous, 7. Willy Semedo(’68 99. Saidou Alioum), 21. Veljko Simic(’53 75. Loizos Loizou), 14. Mariusz Stepinski(’68 9. Andronikos Kakoullis) Andrew Mantzas Twitter: @MantzasNC Post navigation KOSOVO CONTINUES TO HAVE CYPRUS’ NUMBER