Hearts had Craig Gordon to thank as they reached the quarter-finals of the Scottish Cup.
It was a tense night in Paisley as the Jambos eventually overcame St Mirren on penalties following a 1-1 draw after 90 minutes and the 120.
The Buddies could have had more than just Mikael Mandron’s opener to show for their first half efforts but the visitors changed shape and improved later in the game, Calem Nieuwenhof’s 84th minute strike getting them level and forcing the additional 30 minutes.
Veteran goalkeeper and club legend Gordon saved the first two St Mirren penalties to hand his side an advantage and that allowed James Penrice to keep his calm and slot in the winner.
Hearts have now been rewarded with a home tie against Dundee in the Scottish Cup quarter-final draw.
Gordon must decide on his Hearts future at the age of 42 and coming to the end of his contract and has had some of his performances questioned. But he was central to the outcome last night.
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Critchley hails Hearts hero Craig Gordon
Penalty shoot-outs are always tense but Neil Critchley insists he always had faith in his keeper and club captain.
He revealed Gordon was making saves from his teammates in spot kick practice in training so there was no surprise in seeing him repeat that trick.
Speaking at his post-match press conference, he said: “Yeah, I did, because I’d seen him yesterday, saving a few of our lads’ penalties yesterday! He reads where the take is going to go, he’s very intelligent at anticipating where the penalty is going to go, and he’s very quick across his line.
“He’s got brilliant reactions, brilliant reflexes, so I wasn’t surprised he saved some, which is a big compliment to him. And fair play to the players who stepped up and took the penalties, because I thought they were really assured.”
Hearts injuries update
Musa Drammeh and Yan Dhanda were excluded from the Hearts squad last night while Lewis Neilson and Cammy Devlin had to be withdrawn during the game.
Critchley gave updates on all four, saying: “Lewis was a dead leg, so we’ll have to assess him and see how he is, but that was a dead leg. And then Cammy was just not feeling quite right. He said he was fine, and I kept asking him and he was putting his thumb up, so we just took him off as a precaution.
“It was just a squad one, that was it, yeah. Yan [Dhanda] just had a little issue with his hip flexor yesterday in training, so that was more of a precaution.”