The Edinburgh club’s caretaker coach is almost certain to be sitting in the stand for the vital closing series of matches that will shape Hearts’ bid to hang onto Champions League football. The Lithuanian was sent off in the final stages of the ill-deserved defeat by Celtic for rowing with Dougie McDonald, the referee, and while that sort of gung-ho attitude may please some supporters, it will be of little use to the players with whom Ivanauskas will be unable to communicate as Hearts seek to hold off the threat of Rangers to their second place in the Bank of Scotland Premierleague.

It is hard to see someone as experienced as Nevio Scala making that sort of error. The veteran Italian coach reiterated his desire yesterday to come to Tynecastle and try to lead Hearts onto the next level. Vladimir Romanov, the owner, ought to invest in a cool head for whom actions speak louder than words.

Ivanauskas’s ill-discipline at Celtic Park, in only his third match in charge since the sacking of Graham Rix, could be costly. The Hearts caretaker felt wronged at what he perceived was McDonald’s failure to award a late penalty to Roman Bednar and while Ivanauskas refused to attend the post-match press conference, he was accusing McDonald yesterday of possibly costing the Tynecastle club £10 million in revenue if they miss out on the Champions League.

Some of the hyperbole has to be stripped away from that claim. Second place, for which Hearts are aiming, guarantees entry only to the qualifying round of Europe’s premier event, and as Celtic and Everton both found this season, there is no pot of gold if you miss the group stage.

“Everybody makes mistakes and that includes referees,” Ivanauskas said in the Edinburgh Evening News. “However, a referee’s mistake can cost millions of pounds for a club and I think this mistake might be very important for us. I feel very angry, especially at the penalty incident. Millions of people, supporters at the stadium, fans watching on TV in Scotland, England and in Europe will have seen a penalty but the referee doesn’t see it. I can’t understand.

“I was upset at that, and I was angry at the goal that was disallowed, but I spoke to Steven Pressley who was sitting in the stand and he told me that Webster was offside. The performance of the team was perfect but we have no points. That’s not our problem, it’s other people’s problem.”

Ivanauskas symbolises the problem at Tynecastle. There is a growing sense that everyone else is to blame for setbacks and it stems from the very top of the club: it’s the referee’s fault, it’s opponents, it’s the (ex)-manager. The only people capable of applying blinkers are the players, the same core that began this campaign under George Burley, who have reached the Scottish Cup final, and who can still go onto to secure second place if not forced to deal with the sort of sideshow that clung to Hearts last season in the wake of the Saulius Mikoliunas affair.

What will keep Hearts on course are the types of performances that Paul Hartley, Robbie Neilson and Christophe Berra served up in the 1-0 defeat. Hearts outplayed the newly-crowned champions for long spells of the game, such was their desire to taste the Champions League themselves — that they did not, was because of the even greater desire of Gordon Strachan’s side to atone for last season’s final-day collapse that handed the league to Rangers.

What will not help is trying the sort of gamesmanship for which Ivanauskas clumsily opted before the visit to the east end of Glasgow. The caretaker coach blamed Ian Brines, the referee who sent off Takkis Fyssas when Celtic won 3-2 at Tynecastle in New Year’s Day, for costing Hearts the title. That assumption could perhaps have been made if a wafer-thin difference existed between the sides, but when the margin is 20 points, it is superfluous.

It was badly timed. Ivanauskas fell foul of McDonald and can expect the Scottish Football Association to issue a swift punishment. His behaviour was hardly a glowing application for a job: the Lithuanian ran up the track to confront the linesman after Andy Webster had a goal disallowed. As Pressley, the Hearts captain who missed the game after suffering concussion in the Scottish Cup semi-final last weekend, confirmed, Webster was offside — but too late for Ivanauskas to retract his rant.

When Bednar went down in the box after Bobo Balde’s typically clumsy attempt at a clearance, Ivanauskas was sent to the stand for kicking the dugout wall in frustration. Even allowing for whether McDonald was correct or not — and television replays leant towards the former — what good can be gained from Ivanauskas’s action.

John McGlynn, his assistant caretaker, told the post-match press conference: “There are a few newcomers to Scotland at our club and they don’t realise yet that you don’t get those decisions. Roman hasn’t just fallen to the ground for no reason. If it was a dive, he should have been booked, but he wasn’t.”

Actually, Bednar’s very first action of the night was to go down in the opposite box. The Czech forward was not booked then, nor was a foul given, but the referee’s interpretation was clear — and Bednar, who was sent off in the Scottish Cup win over Partick Thistle for trying to dupe the referee with a dive as he rounded Kenny Arthur, the goalkeeper, now seems like the boy who cried wolf — few will ever believe him again.

“That’s the most possession we’ve had at Celtic Park for a long, long time and with a wee break we might have got something from the game,” McGlynn said. “I’ve seen Rangers come here and not play as well as that so if we keep playing like that and show the same determination and courage, I’m sure we will hold on to second place.”

Taken from timesonline.co.uk