Meddle-o-maniac takes lead in Scottish play on Shakespeare

Nicky Campbell
Thursday February 16, 2006
The Guardian

When I am listening to Five Live's 606 phone-in my wife whines in a tape loop of incredulity: "What do these people find to talk about. It's all such crap." And this from a woman who goes to the Chelsea Flower Show every year. What she, with the greatest respect, fails to realise, is that football is an endlessly fascinating mirror held up to human nature and all that business with the ball is just the backdrop.

Take the amorality play being performed at Hearts. So extraordinary have been the twists of the tale, so dramatic the conflicts and so picaresque the dramatis personae that it transcends the parochial confines of the SPL and belongs on the main stage at Stratford-upon-Avon. Here is the reduced Shakespeare: power-hungry mystery man from far-off land inherits crumbling little kingdom and seduces all and sundry with the promise of glories beyond their wildest dreams.

He then callously discards one faithful lieutenant after another. One, the Falstaffian Foulkes, does see the writing on the wall and resigns his chairmanship but the true nature and terrifying scale of the ruler's monomania is, by then, unstoppable. The final act has yet to be played out but we are on the edge of our seats. Like the Bard's best there are two enduring mysteries. Vladimir Romanov's motivation is as unfathomable as Hamlet's and the extent and shape of his finances are murkier than the mists of Elsinore.

What we do know is that he is laughing all the way to the bank - his own bank in Lithuania, which is where he has transferred the club's mighty debt and where it is now accruing interest. Never a lender or borrower be? Try being both. The Scottish Football Association has grave concerns. One insider told me "he is cute as hell all right".

Not only are there stories that Romanov has started to pick the team, but a former player with close links to the club told me that against Dundee United there was talk among the team that he even picked the substitutes and preordained who would be brought on and off and when. Who knows whether this is true or not, but the fact that people close to the club are talking like that betrays a peculiar mood.

This begins to explain why people I have spoken to are reaching for the thesaurus. After a while "incredible", "crazy" and "unbelievable" seem lame. One articulate former player said "it is too ridiculous for words". I guess we have to take liberties with the language of the Bard and make up new ones. The man is a meddle-o-maniac.

John Robertson, the Hearts hero who was ditched as manager after six months, told me: "I met Romanov about four times. We would chat in his suite in the Caledonian hotel. He seemed very aloof but he speaks more English than people know." John went on to tell me about the Lithuanian's rigorous player assessment system. "He would make me mark all the players out of 10 - he asked me to assess the players' performances and rate other players, so it was like 'How would you rate Henrik Larsson?' - I'd say 10 and he'd say then 'What marks would you give one of our boys?' and I would say seven."

What of the chill wind behind those battlement walls? Another Hearts soul told me: "There is an air of paranoia everywhere. It seems like there is a Lithuanian in every office. Everybody is looking over everybody's shoulder to see what is going on." If the news broke that they were enriching uranium in there, it would be a mild surprise.

But Hearts, contrary to pre-season expectations, are challenging the Old Firm, favourites for the Cup and pressing for a Champions League place. It is a measure of Romanov that with this success he can't stop himself rocking the boat on the winds of his own whims. The sacking of George Burley was astonishing. Graham Rix will soon surely be next. What a brilliant character to introduce a third of the way through a drama: a man weakened by personal circumstances, beholden to the Lithuanian for one last chance and who looks riven by an internal struggle between self-preservation and self-respect.

Graham Rix, sex offender. A man who made a mistake and "paid the price" went to Scotland like a wounded lamb ready to be dismembered by a tabloid pack that make their English counterparts look like Jesus. Paxo, interviewing Michael Heseltine about mine closures, once said: "You have achieved the impossible, you have made Arthur Scargill popular." Romanov has done the same for Rix. He is the victim now. An honest guy, beloved of the players but utterly powerless. If this were a Shakespearean tragedy, his would be the role all actors would covet.

Taken from the Guardian/Observer