DURING his first stint in Scottish football with St Mirren, Isma Goncalves was said to be partial to the occasional night out in the same way that England scored the occasional try in their rugby thrashing of Scotland on Saturday.

Four years on, older and wiser and with a young family in tow, Goncalves is again preaching the benefits of team-bonding exercises. The Portuguese was one of nine new signings made by Hearts head coach Ian Cathro in the January transfer window, with the majority pitching up in Scotland for the first time. Goncalves knows from experience it can be difficult trying to settle into a new country, especially one whose culture and climate are very different to what they are accustomed to.

It was Cathro who suggested that the Hearts players meet regularly with their families to mix together away from the training ground, and Goncalves believes getting to know his team-mates off the pitch can only help them play better on it.

"We have been socialising together,” revealed the forward who scored Hearts’ second goal on Saturday in what turned into a 4-0 home rout of hapless Hamilton Accies. “We have been going out for lunches together. And we have been staying at training all together from morning until afternoon. That is very important. We need to get to know each other. Most of the players here are new players so it's very important that we got together.

"It was Ian Cathro's idea. It was the players and their families who were there. I think it has made a difference. It is important because we are getting to know each other better. It helps. I am good with everyone. I like to speak and I like to laugh so it has been good.

“A few of the guys have changed country, their lives have changed. It can take a while but it's going well. The Greek players, for example, have come from a hot country and it's a different life here, definitely! I think if you are happy away from the pitch you will be happy on the pitch. I'm enjoying being back in Scotland. I like the atmosphere here that the fans make.”

Of all the January arrivals, perhaps the greatest focus was on Goncalves given Hearts spend the not inconsiderable sum of around £170,000 to sign him from Famagusta in Cyprus.

His opening spell has been a mixture of good and bad – goals at Fir Park and Easter Road, a red card at Firhill – but the accent was on the positive on Saturday when he got his first Hearts goal at Tynecastle, an almighty swipe into the roof of the net from an indirect free kick.

"It was a very good moment to score my first goal at Tynecastle for Hearts,” he added. “I was looking forward to this and now it has happened and I am very happy. We have been working hard on the training ground and taking on board all of the information the coach has been passing to us. I think that showed against Hamilton.

“We are going to take it game by game but I hope it can be a turning point. We want to keep winning and get some consistency in our performances. We have a good game coming up next against Aberdeen. It's two good teams and we are going to enjoy it.”

In contrast, there was little enjoyment to be found in the Hamilton camp after leaking a further four goals to add to the six conceded at Ibrox the previous weekend. Manager Martin Canning labelled it the worst his team have played all season and Massimo Donati admitted Accies were in a bad way ahead of a return to play Rangers again on Saturday.

“Now is not a good moment for us in terms of results but we have to come in to training on Monday, forget about this game and be positive about the next few games,” said the Italian. “We have lost 4-0 and when you do that there is not a lot you can say. We just have to try and forget and move on as best we can. We have now lost ten goals in the last two games and that’s not good enough. Against Rangers we lost four goals from corners and then we have lost three goals from free-kicks. We have to think about our next game now.

“We need all the players to work together if we want to stay in the Premiership. We know Rangers will be another tough game but every game start 0-0 and we have to take points. It doesn’t matter if we are playing Rangers or not, we have to get some more points. We have to start getting some points because we are not in a good position at the moment. We have to try and stay positive though.”