Mark McGhee, the Motherwell manager, believes that his team can still repeat their feat of European qualification — if they beat Heart of Midlothian at Fir Park this evening. Motherwell qualified for the Uefa Cup by finishing in the top three last season and are ninth in the Clydesdale Bank Premier League.

The return to fitness of Stephen Craigan and David Clarkson gave them a boost over the festive period and they took four points from games against Inverness Caledonian Thistle and St Mirren. However, they still have an 11-point deficit to fourth-placed Hearts, and McGhee knows that they must reduce that.

“I think if we are going to catch them, we have to beat them,” McGhee, who confirmed his interest in Don Cowie, the Inverness midfield player, said. “If we don’t lose to them, we can still make the top six but I think we might struggle to make the top four. There would have to be some sort of catastrophic collapse if they were 11 or 14 points ahead of us. If we can get them back to eight, and get into the top six, we would have them to play again and we might be able to catch them.”

Hearts have failed to score in their past three matches but have conceded only four goals in nine matches, while Motherwell have failed to score in seven matches during the same period.

McGhee feels that the first goal will be crucial and will be on the offensive. “We are back to playing the way we play,” he said. “We have everyone fit, we will play our own game and we feel that is good enough to beat Hearts.”

Motherwell are confident that the game will go ahead after employing a hot-air dome as extra protection against the frost, their undersoil heating having failed in a small area to force the postponement of the original fixture last month. The players trained on the surface yesterday with their normal training pitches again frozen.

The cold weather has made it difficult to assess the players who are on trial, so Simon Elliott, the former Fulham midfield player, Byron Webster, the former York City defender, and Lars Martin Engedal, the Norwegian centre back, will remain at the club.

“They are here until we get on grass,” said McGhee, who revealed that there had been no approaches for his players since the transfer window opened.