There were a mere 22 minutes on the clock when the first chants of ‘Bring on the Hibees’ reverberated around Tynecastle. That is how long it took for this contest to be put to bed as Hearts raced into a three goal lead with a ruthlessness normally only seen inside the Dragons' Den, prompting their supporters to turn their attention to next month’s mouth-watering Edinburgh derby.

Whilst the Jambo faithful can be forgiven for allowing their minds to wander to that February 7th Scottish Cup tie, credit must go to the Hearts players for not merely sitting on their comfortable lead in the second half. At times this season the Edinburgh side have opted to take a more defensive approach after getting their nose in front, but on Saturday there was a hunger to push on and score as many goals as possible.

Six goals from six different scorers illustrates that Robbie Neilson’s team can hurt the opposition in a number of ways and there was a period in the first half when Motherwell could not lay a glove on them. Igor Rossi’s header was deemed to have crossed the line in the 11th minute and Osman Sow dispatched a clinical strike from outside the penalty area five minutes later. When Gavin Reilly slotted home a penalty in the 22nd minute after being brought down by Conor Ripley there was a real fear that Motherwell could suffer total humiliation.

The Lanarkshire side responded well after the break but failed to capitalise on a number of chances with Scott McDonald and substitute Wes Fletcher both passing up decent openings. They were made to pay as Callum Paterson put the result beyond all doubt with a measured 77th minute strike that sparked Hearts back into full flow. Juanma came off the bench to grab his 9th league goal of the season before Arnaud Djoum won a stoppage time penalty with a lovely bit of skill and duly slammed home to complete the rout.

Djoum is one of a number of Hearts players looking forward to sampling the Edinburgh derby for the first time next month. The 26-year-old admits that he is relatively inexperienced in high profile derby matches, but has been well versed on the significance of the occasion by his teammates.

“I am very excited because for me it is the first derby,” said the Belgian midfielder. “I am new here but I have heard a lot about the rivalry between the teams and it will be a great game. It will be a great day for the fans and for the city and I hope that I can help us win.

“Two teams playing in the same city is always a big fight and there is a lot of

history between the sides so it is going to be a huge game.

“I played in two derbies in Poland but I don’t think they were real derbies, like the Edinburgh derby. This will be the biggest derby that I will play, I don’t have a lot of experience in this type of match so I am really looking forward to it.”

Hearts have away league fixtures at Hamilton and Inverness to negotiate before they can fully turn their attention to taking on Hibs, and Djoum believes his side are now reaching peak performance level again after a number of dropped points over the festive period saw them lose ground on Celtic and Aberdeen.

“It was a great performance, like last week also against Aberdeen [1-0 in the Scottish Cup]. We kept up the same level and I am very happy for the team and we just have to continue like that.

“We had too many draws in the last few months but we are in good shape now and just need to keep going and build up a run of wins.

“Sometimes we play well and create a lot of chances but don’t score enough of them and it has cost us points, so it was good to score a lot of goals on Saturday and we go forward with a lot of confidence.”

Motherwell may consider themselves unfortunate that they arrived in Edinburgh on a day that Hearts were at their rampant best, but at times it was far too easy for the home side to cut through the heart of a midfield that badly missed the suspended Keith Lasley and departed Liam Grimshaw.

There was still plenty of experience in the side, however, and Steven Hammell bypassed the opportunity to use their midfield absences as an excuse for the embarrassing result.

“I don’t think we can have any excuses,” said the 33-year-old defender. “You’ve just got to look at yourself and see if you done all that you can. If you are going to look for an excuse you will find one. I don’t think anybody can look at themselves and say they done enough on Saturday.”

With just one point separating second bottom Kilmarnock and 8th placed Motherwell, Hammell is determined to prove that Saturday’s performance was just an off day and will not have a lasting impact upon their fight to stay in the top flight.

“It’s important that we bounce back. It hurts a lot at the minute but we need to bounce back and forget about it quickly,” he added.

“I don’t know if the gaffer is planning to bring in one or two players to help us along the way, but I believe we have got enough in the dressing room to get us out of trouble. It’s so tight and everybody is beating each other just now so we need to pick up results again.”