ZANDER CLARK insists he is fully focused on his new club Hearts as he prepares for an emotional return to St Johnstone’s McDiarmid Park.
The goalkeeper is now Robbie Neilson’s No1 after Craig Gordon was forced off on a stretcher with a double leg break on Christmas Eve following a challenge with Dundee United striker Steven Fletcher.
Clark’s 15-minute cameo at Tannadice was his first competitive minutes for Hearts since joining the club in the summer and now he is preparing for his first start, and it remarkably comes against the club where he spent 13 years and won a historic cup double.
Football often throws up captivating storylines, but the 30-year-old is determined to mark his first start with a victory for his new team.
He said: “It seems to work that way, doesn’t it? My full focus will be on making sure I do things properly in training and getting myself ready.
“We as a team will dust ourselves down and look back on it over the coming days and we’ll make sure we’re ready to go again.
“I’m sure a few of my former teammates will be in touch. Listen, it will be nice to go back and see a few familiar faces. It’s a club close to my heart.
“They gave me a chance in football when I thought that was it done for me. So it’s a club I will always be grateful to. But when I go there on Wednesday I’m no longer there.
“It’s all about being a Hearts player and making sure the team and myself are ready to go.
“I have great memories. I spent 13 years there. I enjoyed some success, I didn’t enjoy some darker periods and stuff.
“But that’s all in the past now, it’s all about going there and preventing them from getting the win.”
Clark may be lacking first-team minutes from recent months but after working alongside Scotland international and his skipper Gordon every day in training, he is confident that he can step up and produce for Neilson’s team.
He continued: “First and foremost I’m gutted for Craigy. He’s been brilliant, even just before his injury you saw the save from Fletcher. It kept us in there with a fighting chance in the game.
“On a personal note I was delighted to come in, it’s bittersweet in the circumstances. But football is a cruel game, these things happen and hopefully, it is not too serious.
“When you’re a goalkeeper and an opportunity opens up and you get a chance you need to make sure you go in and do well for the team and yourself.
“I could stand here all day and tell you how good the big man is, I don’t need to, everybody knows it. It’s a tough task.
“I just need to make sure I am ready to go. I felt good in training this week, I was ready for that moment if it ever came around.
“I have benefitted from working alongside Craig a lot, I said that when I joined the club. Going away with Scotland camps and working with him for 9-10 days you can learn so much from him, he has done so much in the game.
“I am one of those ones, no matter where I go or who I train with, I try and take wee bits of advice and have chats, I am probably a pest to them!
“But it’s something I do, and when he has played at the level he has for the length of his career I think it would be daft not to try and use a bit of that experience and see where you go with it.”
On the difficulties of not being a No1, Clark added: “Yeah, obviously it’s difficult, any footballer wants to play games.
“I was under no illusions when I came to the club that it would be a challenge to play regular football - or even just football!
“But I had it when I broke through at St Johnstone, Alan Mannus was a top goalkeeper as well to try and displace him.
“It’s frustrating but it gives you something to work towards. Something to make sure that when you go into training every day you are ready in case something like this does happen.”
