The trip back down the road from Aberdeen on Tuesday evening was made a bit more pleasurable by the radio accompaniment.

It is not that I am a particular fan of the way broadcasters cover our domestic sport, nor that I have anything against Kilmarnock, but it was enjoyable to listen in to coverage of a game that, at least for a day or two, changed the mood music around Ian Cathro.

Again, it’s not that I have any particular affection for the young coach, but there was something deeply unsavoury about the opprobrium that greeted his appointment a month ago.

Even before Kris Boyd made his now notorious intervention I had listened into another phone-in on Radio Scotland on the point of Cathro getting the job and was bemused by the almost furious way in which one Jamie Fullarton was asserting his view that the 30-year-old would be out of his depth.

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What seemed striking was the strength of feeling he expressed in the context of an appointment made by Anne Budge, the Hearts chairman who has made a pretty decent job of breaking football moulds in recent years so was surely worthy of greater respect, particularly in the context of the current Scottish football environment, screaming out as it is for innovative ways of overcoming a shortage of resources.

Three whole weeks without a win, then and there was pre-match talk of growing pressure on Tuesday, even though Hearts had spent 50 minutes of last Friday’s meeting with a Dundee side coached by the highly regarded Paul Hartley, running rings around their hosts before, admittedly, capitulating pretty horribly in the ensuing 40 or so.

Think about it, though… how many of us would want to be judged on our first three weeks in a job?

Personally I had left Dens Park wondering about a few things that night. Hearts had played a brand of football for much of the game that was a joy to watch, but Cathro had spoken afterwards about a failure on-field leadership when the accusation could reasonably have been made that he might have done more to influence matters, just as Hartley did when introducing Paul McGowan from the bench to whip his team into renewed effort.

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Had we, then, seen during the first 50 minutes the potential impact of a fresh and exciting approach of a lad who comes across as a pretty intense character and, by sporting standards at least, a deep thinker or had naivete had been properly exposed? It was hard to say.

It would be wrong, too, to read too much into Tuesday’s win over Kilmarnock, but in terms of timing the drubbing handed out to Kilmarnock could hardly have been more excruciating for the aforementioned Boyd after he had effectively been invited by their manager, Lee Clark, to justify what he had been saying in the best way a striker can, but failed to take the chance to make a telling point (or three?) when the game was scoreless.

Yet there was also something irksome about a commentator’s observation during that match, in relation to Boyd, that players should perhaps say less about the game.

As both a journalist and a sports fan I could not disagree more. Those directly involved in the game who have interesting views and opinions should always be encouraged to express them.

That said I remember some years ago Jim Telfer, in one of his senior roles as either coach or director of rugby at the SRU, taking major exception to comments made in print by a former player.

If memory serves he seemed to feel it was a form of betrayal that differed from the views of even the most out-spoken journalists whom he, rightly or wrongly, saw as having a different role. My suspicion is that was not out of any particular respect for the journalists, incidentally, instead having more to do with their analysis and opinions being easier to dismiss because they had either never, or at least not for many years, been able to generate additional credibility through having access to the inner sanctums that are dressing rooms.

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Those still playing must obviously use inside knowledge judiciously, but one of the reasons that I am not overly fond of modern punditry is that we are moving towards a worst of both worlds scenario where media outlets rely ever more on the views of those who are untrained as journalists but who are now competing for attention and gigs in ‘shock jock’ fashion.

Personally I hope and expect that whatever happens when Aberdeen visit Tynecastle tomorrow, that Anne Budge and Craig Levein hold their nerve and give Cathro plenty of time.

I hope, too, that Kris Boyd and other players will continue to speak with relative freedom.

As for the rest of us, we are all entitled to our opinions, just as we are entitled to give some more credence than others.