Baffling decision in an increasingly bizarre affair

GRAHAM SPIERS, Chief Sportswriter November 08 2005

Graham Rix, new coach of Hearts? What a weird appointment. It's only the latest, surely, in a series of strange moves initiated by Vladimir Romanov, Hearts' increasingly unfathomable majority shareholder.

How bizarre that after the litany of famous names quoted – Sir Bobby Robson, Claudio Ranieri, Ottmar Hitzfeld et al – we should come to this at Tynecastle. The appointment of Rix leaves those of us who have striven to understand Romanov, and who have used the phrase "cultural gap" while trying not to decry him, feeling more baffled than ever.

Rix, for obvious reasons, is a controversial choice, but uppermost in football terms is his patent lack of prestige as a coach or manager. Rix himself might argue that he has a decent pedigree from his days under Gianluca Vialli at Chelsea, but he hardly fits with the "glamour appointment" which has been spouted from Hearts over these past 14 days.

Rix is also currently on the sex offenders' register, having served six months in prison in 1999 for having unlawful sex with a 15-year-old girl. The question is, should this be held against him in terms of his employment in football?

I would argue "no", although there are moral issues surrounding the Rix case which cannot simply be ignored.

For one thing, his crime will forever be attached to his name, a fact which Hearts will have to adjust to. For another thing, young Hearts fans with keen antennae will want to know about this fuss surrounding their new coach, and parents will suddenly find themselves in the strange position of having to explain Rix's story.

Personally, I have sympathy for Rix. At Chelsea he was regarded as an excellent coach. Yet the fact is that, given the capacity for cruelty of football crowds, Rix will be goaded over his crime. Indeed, in appointing him, Romanov and Hearts are only leaping into that risk-zone which Colin Hutchinson, the former Chelsea chief executive, highlighted on the very day Rix was sent to prison. "Graham deserves some sympathy [for the fact that] he is probably now unemployable in football," he said.

As wrong as Rix's crime was, the truth is that football long ago gave up the notion that it could be an arena which stood beyond moral reproach. Here is not the time or place to go through the game's back-catalogue of misdemeanours, but, suffice to say, Rix is not alone in having caused offence.

My one anomalous thought is, I cannot imagine Rangers or Celtic making such an appointment, specifically because of the nature of Rix's crime, simply because the consequences would be too great. An Old Firm crowd, notwithstanding the hypocrisy of moralising and bigotry being carried in the same breath, would have a field day in song and slogan. That shouldn't prevent the appointment of a figure such as Rix, yet it has to be a factor considered.

I wish Rix well at Tynecastle and hope he proves a success. It is impossible, though, not to have doubts about his appointment.

Taken from the Herald