It was a long, tedious week for Hearts supporters after the defeat by The Evil Empire (Rangers). Things were not exactly exploding all over the place like they had been a week or so earlier, but they were trundling along in their now usual Tynecastle in Crisis strife and misdemeanour. This was mostly centred around the actual start date of new interim head coach - Eugenijus Riabovas.

It seemed that every day this week in the press, he had a different start date, from December 1 for a six-month trial to tomorrow to never. Meanwhile Eduard Malofeev was offski to get his UEFA coaching certificates which he didn't need (not for a while, anyroads).

Malofeev in charge has been a disaster really, regardless of his coaching/managerial capabilities - the fact that he can't speak a word of English has made his position nonsensical and just added to the Hearts headlining the panto season subplot of the last few weeks. Trackside advice, tactical changes and rants needed to be translated to John McGlynn and this week Stevie Frail before being shouted out across the pitch, woefully too late (obviously). A few pundits on the radio, (I think Billy Dodds in particular) have actually come across as being really pretty angry about that.

After the Rangers game, I was firmly of the belief that Hearts still had a way to go before we would turn the corner and things would start to get better. So why, then, was I just as adamantly of the opinion by Friday that Hearts would win 1-0 up in Inverness. Where was the evidence?

I passed this divination on to one of the blokes at work, his response being 'Crap, it will be 1-1'.
Bloody hell, I think, he is just as adamant as me in his prediction. So I inquired how he got to be so confident.
Turns out he has a system. He is a bit of a gambler, not big-time but he knows his way round the bookies and a fixed-odds coupon. He has a system based on the product of the number of goals for and against for each game coming up; this runs to the last five years. There is a factor added to this based on actuals which makes things more realistic. He can then simply input a game - in this case Inverness Caley Thistle v Hearts - into his system and it will pop out the most likely scoreline based on the info and the system. This came out with 1-1, hence his confidence about the scoreline. So he asked me how I got to be so confident. 'I just feel it in ma water, man' .

There was a bit more to it than that, but not much. Based mostly on a few factors that came through and came to mind during Friday.

Last week Steven Pressley was on the bench. We all know that reading Hearts and predicting a teamsheet is next to impossible - but I thought that, given he was on the bench, then maybe his punishment was almost over and he would be back in. So that's a plus that would lift the team.

Likewise I suspected (no basis for this other than it is quite sensible) that Paul Hartley, Bruno Aguair and Jullian Brellier would again make up most of the midfield. Three games together and now it should start to fall into place again, so maybe we would not be so disjointed.

Vladimir Romanov was back over and making noises that he was in conciliatory mood, he wanted to calm the stormy seas - meeting with supporters groups etc. Valdas Ivanauskas was also back and apparently ready to go back to work - Riabovas now no longer necessary? Ivanauaskas was actually over for a court appearance for speeding, but I guess decided to kill two birds with one stone and thought he might as well manage Hearts for a week or two while he is here. No, really,  I thought this was a good thing at least, for more upheaval is a return to a known quantity.

This all brought the idea into my head that, against all the odds, Hearts would actually turn up in Inverness confident and upbeat, ready to take on the world and on the road to recovery and second place.

Premature, I think, and not because we didn't get beat! Premature because it was Inverness up at Inverness - a flying Hearts team on the top of their game would and always do struggle up there. So why would I think this would be different? Pretty simple really, I just put my maroon specs on again.

Did not catch too much of the game, I watched the Scotland v Australia rugby match until we were getting hosed and gave up the ghost on them. The Hearts team, changed again, looked much more like last year's with a back four including Robbie Neilson, Pressley and Takiss Fyassas and Brellier, Aguair and Hartley were in the middle. So was that a good thing?

The game did not quite have 0-0 written all over it but it wasn't far from it. Hearts could have won it, Hartley brought out a very good save low to the keeper's right near the end, but ICT also had their chances and could have taken all three points. A defeat would have been a disaster for Hearts; we would surely have plunged deeper into the maestrom so getting away from Inverness with a point was not so bad. Even if it does mean we lose ground on Rangers and Aberdeen.

There's a crucial fixture list coming up over the next few weeks, leading up to the visit of the stinky Hibees on Boxing Day. First we have to face St Mirren (away), Motherwell (home), Aberdeen (home) and Dundee United (away). Right now it sounds like nonsense but  if we can somehow pull out a run of results from these games running up to Christmas, our season can be turned round and saved.

It's time now for the players to once again come to the fore, starting in Paisley next week. We need a performance and we need a win. I guess I need to concede that this time, method and algorithm have won out over intuition.