Steven MacLean has challenged Hearts to end a chaotic week by beating Rangers to reach the Betfred Cup Final.
The veteran striker knows that preparations for Sunday’s Hampden clash have been a nightmare with manager Craig Levein sacked after the midweek loss to St Johnstone.
But MacLean said: “This is how you get experience, by being in the crap. We are in it.
“We need to work hard to get out of it. We’re there for a reason because we haven’t been good enough. We can’t start talking about getting up the league until we start doing it.
“We just have to take it one game at a time because there’s no point in looking four or five games down the line.
“Our next game is on Sunday and it’s the semi-final of the Cup. We have to get over the St Johnstone result, work on our game plan and make sure everybody does it to the letter of the law and hopefully we can get a result on Sunday.
“We are in a dogfight but the semi-final is a distraction that we can get away from the league.
“We need to make sure we put Wednesday to bed because we need to put a performance on for our fans. I keep saying it but we need to stick together. I’ve been in situations like this before and working hard and keeping together is the only solution.”
Levein stated after the game that many of his players had been at each other’s throat in Perth.
And MacLean said: “Things are not going well so people are looking to others and it won’t happen like that.
“If everybody starts bitching then it’s not going to get any better. You need to stick together and work together as a team.
“If we do the things we are asked to do then hopefully it will turn. You just have to find it within yourself.”
