General George

In John Huston’s film, Caine is attempting to throw together a team of PoW professional footballers to take on a German side in a propaganda match. His character submits a list of the players he wants for his team to one played by Max von Sydow, but is told that several of the pre-second world war eastern European stars he wants are unavailable. When Caine insists they come to his training camp, they arrive emaciated from concentration camps.

When Burley was appointed Hearts manager 37 days ago, he had to play a similar role to Caine in one sense. His first-team squad had been pared down to the bones as Vladimir Romanov, the club’s Lithuanian-based majority shareholder, cleared the decks for the new manager. Like Caine, Burley has also enlisted help from eastern Europe. Two Czechs, Rudolf Skacel and Roman Bednar, and Edgaras Jankauskas, the Lithuanian striker formerly of Porto, shone on their competitive debuts in a 4-2 victory at Kilmarnock last Saturday. For today’s Edinburgh derby at Tynecastle, his team could be further augmented by Julien Brellier, a French midfielder previously at Inter Milan, although Michal Pospisil, another Czech striker, misses out with a hamstring injury. Panagiotis Fyssas, Greece’s left-back at Euro 2004, is another potential recruit and others will surely follow, judging by the way that Burley’s mobile phone kept bursting to life as he sat chatting in his office at Riccarton last week.

It is a bright and airy place, with trees swaying outside in the wind, but quite bare. A framed photograph is awaiting a place on the wall. It shows an Ayr United squad, during his time as manager there, toiling up a sand dune on a beach near Irvine under the direction of Alan Whittle, the former Scottish athlete, and Dale Roberts, Burley’s assistant who died of cancer last year.

Last week’s visit to Kilmarnock was something of a homecoming for him, given that he was born in nearby Cumnock 49 years ago. Gill, his wife, was at Rugby Park along with two of his three children. He ran into Gordon Smith, the agent and pundit, who was a teammate at Kilmarnock Star Boys’ Club when they were both 14. A schoolboy Kilmarnock-supporting chum also turned up but went home less happy than the 3000 travelling Hearts fans who were chanting Burley’s name by the end. The club have already shifted more than 10,000 season tickets, too, and today’s match is a sell-out.

William and Sarah, Burley’s parents, were also there. They waved him off as a 15-year-old to Ipswich Town where he quickly joined the club’s adventures under Bobby Robson. “It was a big decision. My mum and dad both wanted me to stay at school but felt if they’d stopped me going I would have regretted it,” he recalls. “Ipswich just seemed such a homely club, you got the feeling you would be looked after.” He made his debut at 17, against George Best at Old Trafford, and went on to make more than 500 appearances as a polished right-back. He was in Ipswich’s team when they won the FA Cup against Arsenal in 1978 but missed out through injury when they lifted the Uefa Cup in 1981. His family home remains in Ipswich but Riccarton’s proximity to Edinburgh airport means that base is only two hours away from Hearts’ new training ground via Stansted. He plans fleeting returns to Suffolk but an Edinburgh flat will mostly be his home during a season which he admits to wishing had started a few weeks later “because it would have given me the chance to rebuild my squad, some of the lads we have signed haven’t done a full pre-season”.

While John Robertson, his predecessor, seemed to work in an information vacuum, Burley has quickly established a good relationship with Romanov. The club’s majority shareholder is signing the cheques, but who signs the Czechs? “I’ll recommend players and he’ll recommend players and we don’t always agree,” says Burley. “When we agree, we bring players in. It’s working together. Mr Romanov is the one that pays the money, so he’s looking out for his investment, but I am the one that builds the side. The key is being able to bring quality players in and without Mr Romanov the club wouldn’t be able to do it.”

Burley is also happy to exploit Romanov’s contacts in eastern Europe and sees the Czech Republic as a particularly ripe market, given that they are currently ranked fourth in the world. “I am amazed that nobody has tapped into it more. Czech players are strong physically, good athletes and have a great mentality. We’ve got a couple more good young Czechs who we saw at Derby and are still monitoring. Everybody is into your Portuguese, French, Dutch and Scandinavian markets but we have good contacts over there.”

He is particularly impressed by Bednar, who is on loan from FBK Kaunas, another club owned by Romanov, and is confident that he will soon make Hearts supporters forget the loss of Lee Miller to Dundee United. “He’s the best young striker I have worked with,” says Burley.

His own targets are clearly defined. Third place this season and a return to European football. Thereafter, some solid evidence that the gap between the Old Firm and the rest, 31 points last season, is being bridged. After meeting Romanov in Lithuania, Burley felt there would be sufficient funds to realistically pursue Alex McLeish and Gordon Strachan, two former Scotland teammates. “I signed a two-year contract because I wanted to see how it went and hopefully by two years the gap has been closed. Who knows how close we can get to them? I see signs of Hearts becoming a very strong team, but whether it is going to be good enough to challenge Rangers and Celtic has to be proven one day.”

Romanov’s backing has also allowed him to resist overtures by Celtic towards Paul Hartley, and Rangers for Andy Webster. “I have told them both I want them to stay until January and then we’ll reassess it. We’re in talks with Paul at the moment about extending his contract. Andy’s had the situation where he has had his head turned a little bit by another club. Craig Gordon has two years on his contract and we’ll be looking to extend that and Elvis (Steven Pressley) has just signed a new contract, so we have a nucleus of four Scottish internationals, which is terrific. The Old Firm haven’t got that. I want to keep my best players.”

Turning down significant bids for his starlets was not a luxury afforded him at Ipswich, where a sale-per-season was required to balance the books, or indeed at Derby, where a hefty debt necessitated the departure of Tom Huddlestone, the brightest prospect of his team there, to Tottenham this summer. He admits to being “a little disappointed” by Hearts’ youngsters in comparison. “You have to lift the standard.

After working with the kids at Ipswich and Derby I feel they were a wee bit further advanced. Your 17- and 18-year-olds should be playing regularly in the reserves and pushing into the first-team. When you look at Scotland as a whole, there are not players coming through playing regularly at the top level. I think the facilities haven’t helped. They don’t play at school, they don’t play in parks, so as a professional club you have to bring them in and give them the facilities to play on. The only way you are going to get better is by playing games, repetition.

“It’s very important that you give them opportunities to do that but the reality for the next year or so is that we have to get a first team together that wins games, we can’t wait for 16- and 17-year-olds because we want success now and the fans want success now.”

Burley sounds like an Old Firm manager as he says this. Hearts are closing the gap in expectations, if nothing else.

Taken from timesonline.co.uk