Derek McInnes’ frustration over Hearts losing the title to Celtic clearly had not disappeared by the time he collected his SFWA Manager of the Year award.

The Hearts manager picked up the prize only a day after the dramatic collapse at Celtic Park which saw Martin O’Neill’s side snatch the Premiership on the final afternoon of the season.

3EFRPKH Celtic’s Callum McGregor with the Scottish Premier League Trophy following his sides title deciding match against Heart of Midlothian at Celtic Park. Picture date: Saturday May 16, 2026.

Hearts had spent months at the top of the table.

Even heading into the closing stages against Celtic last Saturday, McInnes’ side were still within touching distance of delivering one of the biggest title shocks Scottish football has seen in years. Then everything changed quickly once Daizen Maeda scored before Callum Osmand’s stoppage-time goal sparked chaos inside Celtic Park.

VAR became one of the talking points afterwards.

There was frustration from the Hearts side over several decisions throughout the title run-in and emotions were still clearly raw when McInnes attended the Scottish Football Writers’ Association awards ceremony less than 24 hours later.

Despite losing the title, McInnes still swept up the individual awards after leading Hearts into a genuine championship challenge while also securing Champions League qualification.

Gordon Dalziel has now revealed what happened after McInnes collected the award on stage.

The former striker was in attendance at the ceremony and explained how the Hearts manager ended his speech with one final parting shot.

He said: (Open Goal), “I was there, I thought his speech was good.

“Ah, no, he never elaborated on it, then he just went right at the end as he was walking off, he went, f*** VAR, and just walked off.”

The reaction probably sums up where Hearts were mentally after the weekend.

McInnes had just watched his side lose the title in the final minutes of the season after coming so close to pulling off something nobody expected back in August. Even with the manager of the year awards arriving afterwards, the frustration was always likely to remain fresh.

3EFPXC7 Celtic manager Martin O’Neill and Heart of Midlothian manager Derek McInnes during the William Hill Premiership match at Celtic Park, Glasgow. Picture date: Saturday May 16, 2026.

From Celtic’s side though, there will be little sympathy.

O’Neill’s team won eight straight league matches during the closing run-in and took full advantage of Hearts dropping points away from Tynecastle late in the season. That ultimately decided the title more than anything VAR-related.

7 COMMENTS

  1. Martin O’Neill new he had a better squad abmnd he had players coming back he knew keep opisition on the move as soon as they start bringing on subsitutes cause there first picks were wilting that allowed Celtic space thats how we scored late goals cause we wore the opisition down squad game and we had far the best squad teams put so much into Stopping Celtic yhey were on there knees after 70 odd minutes

  7. hearts where just not good enough”but it was a good attempt to win the leauge by them but was still not good enough”. And it was even better winning at paradise the face’s on mcinnes and Shankland was a picture to be hold as they say the cream always rises to the top.😁😁😁💚💚💚

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