Kilmarnock gaffer Derek McInnes has started fining players for needless fouls in training in a bid to crackdown on their red card woes.
Liam Donnelly saw red for picking up two yellow cards in their 2-1 loss at Ross County on Saturday – the fifth red card Killie have received in just 10 domestic fixtures this term.
The visitors had been a goal to the good before the dismissal and their disciplinary concerns have undoubtedly played a part in them sitting in ninth place ahead of tonight’s clash at Tynecastle against Hearts.
Donnelly will miss the game due to suspension while both Stuart Findlay and Liam Polworth have been ruled out through injury.
Speaking to the media ahead of their trip to Edinburgh, McInnes said: “We’ve done it for a while now, for things like pulling. Sometimes in training games players will make a foul and I want us to get away from that so we fine players for that type of thing, pulling players back and stopping promising attacks.
“Also questioning and complaining dubious refereeing decisions, which is a million because I’m the referee most of the time.
“We introduced that and if anybody annoys me too much they get fined for that.
“So we are just trying to train the players to be more disciplined and more accepting of decisions, good or bad.
“Sometimes I’ll make decisions that are clearly wrong, just to test them and I want us to try and be just a bit more concentrated on everything on the pitch.”
But while Killie are focusing on trying to cut out their own mistakes, the boss also insisted there’s a lack of consistency from the officials.
He added: “The message to the players is to be squeaky clean, to be really sure about our work.
“We’ve got not to give any sort of opportunities for people to be red carded, but consistency has got to be there, and it’s not there. I don’t care what anybody says, that isn’t there at a minute.
“We’ve got to own the fact that we’ve had so many red cards and we’ve got to be better at that because it’s having a big impact on results, big impact on team selection, and it’s not an ideal situation.
“It is the first time I’ve ever had as many red cards managing a team and it’s something that I don’t want to become a habit.
“We could potentially be another seven or eight points better off.”