Hearts 1-3 Celtic: Christophe Berra kicks Brendan Rodgers criticism into long grass
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Celtic's Callum McGregor and Stuart Armstrong appeared to joke about the pitch before kick-off
Christophe Berra has defended Hearts' decision to keep their grass long amid criticism from Brendan Rodgers, saying it helps his side compete with Celtic.
The Celtic boss said the Tynecastle pitch was not of the required standard.
But Hearts captain Berra said: "It depends what team you're playing.
"You're not going to have it nice and slick for Celtic with their top players. At the moment, we're not at a place to be competing with Celtic at that level."
Hearts had ended Celtic's 69-game unbeaten domestic run with a 4-0 win on the champions' last visit to Tynecastle in December.
But they adapted to the conditions this time round, coming back from an early Kyle Lafferty strike to win thanks to goals from Dedryck Boyata, Moussa Dembele and Scott Sinclair.
"Celtic, financially, they're miles ahead of us, squad-wise they're champions for a reason and you need to take it to your advantage," Berra told BBC Scotland when asked about the pitch.
"The pitch was not great when we played them before at Tynecastle and today the grass was long and dry and they got the victory and that's why they're champions."
Berra thought Celtic's depth of squad paid dividends as some of Hearts' players, just back from injury, tired because of a lack of match fitness.
"Overall, I don't think it was a bad performance from us," he said. "It was more like Hearts on the front foot - not that dissimilar from the game we won 4-0 but where we took our chances."
Craig Levein and Brendan Rodgers disagreed about the Tynecastle pitch
Manager Craig Levein recalled that Celtic had also complained about the pitch in December.
"There wasn't enough grass on it last time, eh?" he said. "If they tell me how much they want, we will try and get it right next time!"
Rodgers said he had been forced to change his tactics to an atypical long-ball game at half-time with the game tied at 1-1.
"I sit a little bit embarrassed because of the pitch," he said.
"I'm talking about for the spectators and the young, gifted players in their team who can't dribble or pass the ball properly because of the grass.
"If that's what you want to do, then fine, but it's not football.
"It was the first time I said to a team of mine 'building the game from behind is a huge risk because the ball is getting stuck', so at half-time I said we had to play a more direct game and, from there, we dominated the game.
"It was a brilliant win for us, having to cope and play a totally foreign game."