'I laughed as Little Romanov said he should replace me'

Stuart Bathgate

GEORGE Foulkes lifted the lid on the civil war at Hearts last night when he revealed that manager George Burley and chief executive Phil Anderton were dismissed because they dared to have different ideas to majority shareholder Vladimir Romanov.

Among other areas of disagreement, Anderton had questioned the wisdom of sacking Burley, while Burley had repeatedly enraged Romanov with his team selections.

Speaking after Roman Romanov, the son of the majority shareholder, had held a media conference to explain the Lithuanians' side of the story, deposed chairman Foulkes said that neither of the Romanovs nor any of the other board members had ever voiced dissatisfaction with Anderton's conduct as chief executive before they suddenly decided they wanted him out.

Foulkes believes that since acquiring more than 50 per cent of the shareholding in Hearts 12 days ago, Vladimir Romanov has felt able to work in an increasingly dictatorial fashion, and that Romanov junior and the other remaining board members are only there to do his bidding.

"Neither of the Romanovs said to me or to Phil that there were boxes which he was not ticking," said the Labour peer, referring to Roman's claim that Anderton "ticked most but not all of the boxes" when they examined his suitability to be the chief executive of Hearts. "There was never any criticism of the work he has done.

"I think any criticism of him now is something they have just thought up in an attempt to justify their behaviour. There were bits and pieces about [alleged] leaks to newspapers, and hints about Phil's disagreements with Vladimir and some of his people. But Phil was working in the way the board wanted him to do. He was answerable to the board, not directly to Vladimir."

Foulkes also rejected claims that Anderton had mishandled the negotiations to find a successor to Burley as manager, specifically the suggestion by one source that the chief executive had failed to give Claudio Ranieri details of the salary on offer before the Italian met Romanov.

"When I and Phil spoke to Vladimir about finding a new manager, he said there were no limits. He would pay whatever it took to get the right person. Now clearly there would be negotiations and he would not simply pay any sum demanded, but there was no suggestion that the salary on offer would be a derisory one."

As Foulkes sees it, the more successful Hearts became on the field, the more Romanov regarded the club as his pet project - and the more damaging his interventions grew. Having had some well publicised disagreements with Burley over team selection, he found himself in a position to exact revenge once he bought out the stakes held by Halifax Bank of Scotland and the media company SMG to take his own shareholding to around 55 per cent.

"It's only in the last three weeks that he's been in Edinburgh constantly," Foulkes said. He also disputed a club spokesman's version of events at the Monday-afternoon board meeting. While accepting it was technically correct that he had been voted out of the chair, he said that had only been done long after he had made it plain he would resign in any case the minute the board sacked Anderton.

Romanov tried to talk him round and even turned up at Foulkes' house in Ayr on Sunday night bearing wine and flowers bought from a local convenience store.

"On Saturday night in Edinburgh, Sunday night in Ayr, and Monday morning in Edinburgh again, I made it clear that if they pressed ahead with the sacking of Phil Anderton I would resign. At the board meeting on Monday afternoon, after they had gone ahead with sacking Phil, I again intimated that I was going to resign.

"But before I could go through the procedure for doing so, little Romanov [ie Roman] said 'I move that the chairman be replaced'.

"I said 'By whom?' He said 'By me'.

"I laughed."

Foulkes is convinced that the Lithuanians on the board are little more than placemen for the elder Romanov, there to do his bidding, not to engage in independent thought. He also fears that Romanov is so impetuous that his actions could cause the club problems with the financial authorities. "I don't think they know what they're letting themselves in for or have thought about the implications of what they've done. Have thy checked with the FSA, for example, about having the same person as the chairman and the chief executive of a listed company?

"Also, according to best corporate practice you are supposed to have at least two independent directors on the board. We are a bit concerned when we only had one, which was me - I was not an employee of the club. Now they don't have any."

The Hearts board now consists of Roman Romanov, his cousin Julija Goncaruk, and two other of their compatriots - the former acting chief executive Sergejus Fedotovas, and the Lithuanian FA official Liutauras Varanavicius. The sole remaining Scot on the board is Stewart Fraser, who was appointed by the previous chief executive, Chris Robinson, and who has done nothing to suggest he will be the fearless voice of the fans in the boardroom.

Despite his disillusioning end to his 18-month reign as chairman, Foulkes said he had no regrets about stepping down. "I'm convinced I've done the right thing, In some ways I wish I had done it earlier when George Burley left. If I'd known then what I know now I would have left. There's no way I'd go back."

Foulkes is adamant he will remain an active supporter. Indeed, he will attend Saturday's home game against Dundee United, having declined to give up his season ticket when he became chairman in April last year. "As long as no-one bans me from the ground I will be in the Wheatfield Stand," he said. "I will be among a better class of person there."

Burley paid the price for choosing Brellier ahead of Mikoliunas

GEORGE Foulkes revealed last night that Vladimir Romanov had complained incessantly about the Hearts manager George Burley's insistence on picking Julien Brellier for the team.

It had been known beforehand that Romanov, the majority shareholder in the Edinburgh club, had not been convinced of the merits of the French midfielder, but the former Tynecastle chairman said that the Lithuanian's initial scepticism had turned into something approaching obsession.

"Romanov didn't like the fact that Julien Brellier was being played regularly and that Saulius Mikoliunas was being left out," said the former Labour MP, who now sits in the House of Lords. "He went on and on about Brellier."

Burley had only been allowed to sign Brellier after explaining his reasons for doing so in writing to Romanov. Since joining Hearts, the Frenchman has made the midfield anchor role his own, and has played with increasing confidence.

Mikoliunas, on the other hand, has made only fleeting appearances in the team after losing form early on in the season. Burley was said to want to get rid of him from the club after he took time off from pre-season training to go on honeymoon, and it is believed that Romanov intervened directly to keep him on Hearts' books.

Brellier is essentially a defensive central midfielder, while Mikoliunas is either a winger or an attack-minded wide midfielder.

In other words, the two are not competitors for the same jersey.

In fact, and somewhat ironically, the man who has been doing most in recent weeks to keep Mikoliunas out of the team has been Samuel Camazzola - the Brazilian who was signed by Romanov despite the fact that Burley had not seen him play.

Given that both Brellier and Camazzola are now in the Hearts team on merit, Romanov and Burley might have come to an accommodation and acknowledged that they both knew a good player when they saw one.

Such humility, however, appears to be well beyond the reach of Romanov at least. No real explanation has been given either by the Hearts board or by Burley himself for the latter's dismissal as manager.

Various hints have been given by those close to the club or to Romanov, suggesting that in some way or other the former Scotland international and Ipswich Town manager was guilty of not fulfilling his duties correctly, but Foulkes is convinced that such suggestions are no more than a smokescreen for an action which was based on no more than the pique of a powerful man who is accustomed to getting his own way.

"George Burley was putting his full efforts into the job," Foulkes insisted.

Taken from the Scotsman