In the last home game before the league split, Hearts took on Livingston at the Home of the Set Fare Arena, with Hearts looking to regain the top spot of the Scottish Premiership and Livingston eager to close the gap to Kilmarnock in an attempt to escape relegation back to the Championship.

After three consecutive draws, Livingston lost last time out to fellow strugglers Kilmarnock. Hearts meanwhile had narrowly beaten Dundee in their last game before the international break.

Both Livingston and Hearts were missing key players with Brooklyn Kabongolo and Frankie Kent both missing the game due to suspension.

Marvin Bartley made four changes to the lineup with Macaulay Tait (not able to play against his parent club), Scott Pittman, Robbie Muirhead and the suspended Brooklyn Kabongolo making way for Babacar Fati, Scott Arfield, Lewis Smith and Stevie May.

Derek McInnes also chose to make changes to the Hearts lineup with Pierre Kaboré, Jordi Altena, Michael Steinwender, and the suspended Frankie Kent dropping out, with Craig Halkett, Lawrence Shankland, Stephen Kingsley and Islam Chesnokov coming into the starting XI.

After a frantic start, a quick break by Montaño down the left in the fifth minute found Fati on the overlap, whose cross was only cleared as far as Stevie May whose first attempt was blocked, only to bounce straight back to him and then he slotted a low drive from the edge of the box into the bottom left corner. Livi had an early lead against the league leaders.

Hearts began to build up pressure deep in the Livingston half, with Cláudio Braga at the centre of Hearts’ play, but Livingston were up to the challenge and cleared the ball easily.

Jérôme Prior was then tested shortly after but Cláudio Braga’s shot was straight at the Livingston goalkeeper.

Hearts grew into the game with a number of half chances in the first twenty minutes, however Livi remained dangerous on the break and from resulting corners.

Livingston made a mess of a corner which led to a Hearts break up the field, a curling cross into the box from the left by Marc Leonard was met by Lawrence Shankland who buried his header past Jérôme Prior, all things back to par as Hearts made it 1-1 in the twenty-fourth minute.

Just before the break, the ball dropped to Cláudio Braga on the edge of the box, whose shot brought out a great save to his left-hand side by Jérôme Prior.

Hearts continued to press for a goal, with several half chances being blocked heroically by Livingston defenders.

The second half kicked off under the lights due to a half-time snowstorm which added another element to the remainder of the game.

A frantic start to the second half saw tackles flying in from both sides. With the ball bouncing around the Livingston box, Lawrence Shankland found Cláudio Braga with a looping header across goal and he nodded it home to make it 2-1 to Hearts.

Moments later, the ball broke down the left for Livingston as Montaño cut the ball back to Joel Nouble who scuffed his shot but it made its way through to Lewis Smith who smashed the ball high into the roof of the net, bringing things back to parity at 2-2 after an hour.

As the pace slowed, both teams had half chances in the middle of the half as the snow gave way to blue sky and sunshine.

Livingston started to pass the ball around with confidence, which led to Finlayson firing in a low cross which was narrowly missed by everyone and found the hands of Alexander Schwolow.

As the minutes ticked by, the nerves began to show from both sides with misplaced passes and missed tackles. The game had a scrappy edge to it with five minutes left.

Deep into stoppage time, with Hearts looking for a winner, the ball broke up field and Robbie Muirhead turned on the halfway line but was brought down by Marc Leonard. The referee initially only showed a yellow but after a short VAR check, Marc Leonard was then deemed to be the last man and was sent off to cheers from the

Livingston end. With little time left, the resulting free kick was the last kick of the game.

The 2-2 draw meant that Hearts returned to the top of the table, and Livingston continued their recent run of good form with another point for their total.

Match report: Alastair Hogg

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