Instead, the talk has consistently been about how their collapse was down to referee decisions, rather than the fact that they didn’t win a single game outside of Edinburgh after January.

McGeady called out the Rangers boss over his comments, reminding him that he blew it — he also took a dig at his implication that his and Lawrence Shankland’s respective moves to Ibrox this summer were entirely separate.

Aiden McGeady on Derek McInnes: ‘You blew it’

On the Go Radio Football Show, McGeady chuckled whilst listening to McInnes’ comments. Asked why by host Paul Cooney, he said: “Yeah, it was just the injustice being mentioned a few times. What was the injustice? Was it the few contentious decisions, he said?

“At the end of the day, it was in your hands, and you blew it. It was in your hands and you blew it. All you had to do was draw the last game of the season, and you couldn’t do it.

“I can understand why you’re going to put it down to, ‘It’s not my fault, it’s not the team’s fault, it’s referees’… but yeah. For me, that’s you glossing over that.

“Also, about Shankland — did you just get a phone call on the golf course and he didn’t know Shankland was leaving? That’s amazing, isn’t it? So he didn’t where he had the heads up that he was going to Rangers, and he said to Lawrence Shankland, ‘By the way, get yourself to Rangers, because I’m going?’

“Listen, I’ve been in football a long time. I know how things work. I’d be surprised if that didn’t happen. I’m probably going too far on the injustice part, but essentially, that’s how it boils down. The best team over 38 games wins the league. His team fell short.”

On a final day of destiny in Glasgow, the Edinburgh side were denied a historic title win by a pair of late goals by Celtic’s Daizen Maeda and Callum Osmand, triggering wild celebrations.

Hearts’ response to the on-pitch celebrations was to immediately walk up the tunnel. They ended up leaving the stadium still in their jerseys, arriving back at Tynecastle in tears.