HEARTS will get their hands on the Championship trophy at the weekend but a host of players will likely miss out on a league winner's medal.
Scottish Professional Football League rules dictate that only those that participate in 25 per cent of matches in the second tier qualify for a medal.
That means players have to feature in at least nine league games, whether starting or as a substitute.
January recruit Kenny Anderson must play some part in Saturday's televised visit of Rangers if he is to be awarded a medal, having made four starts and four substitute outings since his move from RKC Waalwijk.
But Dale Carrick, who has been plagued by injury, is set to miss out after making a total of four appearances during the record-breaking campaign.
Back-up goalkeepers Jack Hamilton and Scott Gallacher also will not receive a medal, while long-serving midfielder Scott Robinson falls short having made only five outings
Having made five starts and 10 appearances from the bench, midfielder Jason Holt qualifies even though he joined Sheffield United on loan in January.
And having made nine substitute appearances, striker Gary Oliver will also be handed a medal, as will St Johnstone-bound defender Brad McKay.
Meanwhile, Neilson, who was yesterday named among four nominees for the PFA Scotland Manager of the Year award, insists Carrick is part of his plans for their return to the top-flight after the pacey striker's campaign was hampered by a hamstring problem.
The 21-year-old was initially sidelined by a tear in October and then aggravated the injury in February during his short-term loan stint at Raith Rovers.
Carrick has been restricted to six outings in all competition, netting twice, but Neilson insists he has not forgotten about the marksman.
He said: "Dale has a big future here. He's had a difficult season. Last year he did really well, coming as a young player and scoring some really important goals. "This one has been difficult for him. He'll come back for pre-season and be part of the squad. I see him being involved next season, similar to young Gary Oliver.
"He'd probably hope that the season would last another couple of months because he's just starting to get himself fit and we're about to break up.
"He came to me last week and asked if he could play in the Under-20s. We hadn't planned to put him in. We intended giving him another week's training but he wanted to play. I think he's just desperate to get going now."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article