Hearts: Narrow wins Foundation of Success as Leaders edge out Falkirk

More of those would be very welcome as their title challengers start to make their move.

Danny Ruhl’s Rangers have lost just once – away to Porto in the Europa League – in 14 games since losing to Tynecastle in December.

Reigning champions Celtic, who are just six goals behind Hearts with two games in hand, have lost just once in 11 games, albeit an agonizing 4-1 Europa League loss at home to Stuttgart on Thursday, reigniting their habit of scoring late goals under interim boss Martin O’Neill.

Motherwell, who are 10 games behind and have a game in hand, will also certainly have a say in the fate of the title given they have lost just once in their last 10 matches.

Hearts’ three wins in their last seven games aren’t exactly impressive, and McInnes admitted: “In the first half, there was a period of 20-25 minutes where we looked really worried.

“Our stuff when we had the ball was good all game, but our stuff needed to be better.”

However, the Hearts boss believes his side, on the whole, have dealt well with John McGlynn’s dangerous Burns.

He added: “We were much better in the second half than we were in the first. “We were the team that looked most likely to score the second goal in the second half.

“I watch Falkirk often and they usually dazzle teams, they usually send endless crosses into the box, they usually create a lot of chances.

“They rarely don’t score. But that wasn’t really the case. In the second half, we were comfortable enough, we kept them at bay.

“There were a lot of people tipping Falkirk to come here and win, but I think we absolutely deserved to win.”