| Jim Jefferies is looking to his players to fulfil the fans' expectations by securing a European place this season. Hearts welcome St Johnstone to Edinburgh tomorrow and want to get off to a winning start in their bid to improve on last season's sixth-placed finish. Despite that disappointment, the club's fans are set to turn out in force again after the club sold over 10,000 season tickets for the sixth successive year. fans have watched as Jefferies brought strikers Kevin Kyle and Stephen Elliott and Falkirk defender Darren Barr to Gorgie but he Jefferies knows the fans want to see an improvement on last term. He said: "It's not just about Jim Jefferies having a realistic target, it's about Hearts having a realistic target which is they should be up at the right end of the table competing for the European places and putting a challenge in to the Old Firm. It's about getting a team on the pitch and getting everything right behind the scenes to push for that challenge. This club has its own expectations and it's up to us to fulfil them. They're wanting to see a good Hearts side up there, they want to see us playing a certain way and we have to give them that as well. These boys have worked their socks off to reach that and it's in their hands, they have to show they're good enough to match that expectation. It's not easy, we know there is not a lot between the sides outside the Old Firm and there are quite a few clubs with the same ambition so it should make for quite a competitive season." Jefferies' preparation for the weekend's curtain-raiser against St Johnstone has been disrupted by a raft of international call-ups, with Lee Wallace, Marius Zaliukas, Arvydas Novikovas and Eggert Jonsson away on duty for their respective countries this week. He said: "It's been a big factor, I don't think St Johnstone had many away. Wallace played the full game for Scotland against Sweden and got home at three in the morning. It's something you have to put up with, there are a lot of teams better off than us and a lot of teams worse off than us. I'm sure Rangers had quite a few away and I don't think anyone will be particularly happy about it but you just have to get on with it. It's put down as an international week and it's a strange week to put down for a friendly but nothing surprises me in this game, especially the time I've been in it." |