The 2012 William Hill Scottish Cup final became a pitiless rout but in the shared offices and workplaces of Edinburgh and the Lothians there will be Hearts fans who insist on taking it into extra time, starting this morning and ending - well, never. Imminent departures mean many of the protagonists will never play together again but what they produced on Saturday will echo around the capital for decades.
For Hearts, Carlsberg don't do cup final wins etc - but this was impossibly ecstatic: wildest dreams exceeded and fairy-tale script followed to the letter. There is an unmissable superiority complex about Hearts when it comes to their neighbours and how they revelled in the other half's pitiful, antimagnetic relationship with the Scottish Cup. It was Edinburgh's final but Hearts owned it, pummelling this sorry Hibs team.
The embarrassment was both local and national. As the buses and trains headed east in the hours after full time it was clear Hibs would not be allowed to leave the occasion behind in Glasgow. Once they were back home Hearts would be in their faces, on their doorsteps, ramming it down their throats at full volume.
Hearts are building a fine modern Scottish Cup record for themselves. That's three wins in the last 14 years, a good average, and after narrow squeezes against Rangers and Gretna they indulged themselves by winning this one by a country mile. No team had scored five in a Scottish Cup final since the mid-1990s and they could have buried Hibs under seven or eight. Fittingly the winners' goals came from two midfielders and both full-backs. Their defence was comfortable and their midfield, where Ian Black and Rudi Skacel were superb, bossed the game.
They must enjoy the moment because for the time being it looks like a climax rather than a catalyst. They will suffer the same fate as any non-Old Firm trophy winner: their team will be immediately weakened rather than strengthened. Skacel is on his way out and his goals and devilment will be missed. Allowing Black's presence, strength and balance to be removed is a depressing consequence of Vladimir Romanov's unwillingness to continue bankrolling a high overall wage bill.
Hearts were late in paying their players on four occasions during the season and that contributed to a season of erratic results. They posted wins over Celtic and Rangers and finished the season as trophy winners, yet it was a campaign in which they lost three times to St Johnstone, went out of the Scottish Communities League Cup to Ayr United, and trailed Motherwell by 10 points and Dundee United by seven.
Little was said in the heat of the moment to reassure their supporters that Paulo Sergio's future would be satisfactorily resolved. The manager has been an authoritative, unflappable presence at the club and he knew how to deal with inferior and nervy underdogs. Hearts pressed aggressively from the start, closing down the men in green shirts, playing on their uncertainties and forcing them into hurried clearances and errors.
Most of the half-dozen goals were untidy and assisted by Hibs' hopeless defending. They could not clear a corner and did not close down Darren Barr at the early first. Skacel was given the time to turn and fire home the second, which took a deflection off James McPake. The Hibs man jabbed home their solitary goal after Tom Soares was given too much space to deliver a cross, but it was about the only time Hearts switched off in the match. Garry O'Connor blazed one effort sky high but otherwise he and Leigh Griffiths were in maroon pockets.
Hibs scoring just before half-time promised to save the final as a contest, but events accelerated away from them. Pa Kujabi got his second booking – and a deserved red card – for holding Santana's shirt, although the winger deceived referee Craig Thomson by clipping his own heel to go down in the box for a penalty. Danny Grainger tucked that away to puncture Hibs again, although it was an exaggeration for them to claim the moment as a real turning point. They did not have the quality to hurt Hearts, or to keep them out. They did not bother marking Skacel at a corner three minutes later and he helped the ball across the box for Ryan McGowan to ram home a header in the six-yard area.
It was excruciating by then. Hampden had been packed to the gunnels – the occasion really did feel different and special – but the Hibs support quickly evaporated: angry, numb, silent. Manager Pat Fenlon filleted his players for lack of desire but that was a deflection. Having narrowly avoided relegation they are a dreadfully poor side lacking technique, confidence or organisation. Tormentor-in-chief Skacel helped himself to another. Hearts chanted that they wanted six and many in the ground would have thought about seven, that iconic Edinburgh derby number. Fenlon, out of ideas or hope, was sent to the stand in the final minute for a stiff-armed gesture to the Hearts fans as they mocked him.
To say it wasn't his day would be an understatement. A headline in the match programme had even called him "Fenton". By showing the Hearts supporters that they had got to him, the humiliation was complete.
From this morning it will all be replayed around the capital. Spare a thought for those Hibees who want to stay hidden under the duvet.
