HEARTS have dispatched former Alloa manager Tom Hendrie to Belarus for a European spying mission on their prospective Champions League opponents.

Hendrie has flown with youth coach Stevie Frail to the town of Gomel to take in this evening's first qualifying round meeting between Shakhtyor Soligorsk and Siroki Brijeg, which kicks off at 8pm local time (6pm UK).

Head coach Valdas Ivanauskas is seeking to gather knowledge on both sides and Hendrie and Frail will report back to Tynecastle with separate dossiers on each team, one of whom will face Hearts in the Champions League's second qualifier in two weeks' time.

School teacher Hendrie has been doing part-time scouting work for Ivanauskas and his assistant John McGlynn since parting company with Alloa last season. However, this latest assignment is his most high-profile to date.

"We don't know who is going to go through so Tom will watch one team and Stevie will watch the other tonight," said McGlynn. "We wanted to research this correctly and that's why we've sent two of them out.

"They'll give us a report when we get back to Edinburgh on how both sides shaped up and what their strengths and weaknesses are. We'll also have people at the return leg.

"Tom's been doing match reports for us since last season, looking at the teams we were about to play.

"We asked him to do a bit of scouting and it keeps his interest in football, especially over the summer when he has spare time with the schools being off.

"He has a good eye and he'll give us a detailed report."

McGlynn concedes that Hearts' knowledge of Siroki Brijeg is scarce, although the club have an insight into Shakhtyor Soligorsk through their sporting director Eduard Malofeev and majority shareholder Vladimir Romanov.

"There are connections because we have people who have worked in Belarus, but we really don't know much about the Bosnian side. We hope to learn a lot more from the guys who will be at tonight's match," added McGlynn. "We're concentrating mainly on ourselves at the moment and what's going on here."

An hour before kick-off in Gomel, Hearts are in friendly action against the Romanian side FC Cluj in the Austrian town of Steinach-lerdning.

They return to Scotland tomorrow before facing Preston at Deepdale on Saturday and then hosting the Spanish side Osasuna in a glamour friendly at Murrayfield next Wednesday, July 19.

Ticket sales for that match are nearing the 10,000 mark, with club officials expecting a crowd of around 20,000 by virtue of an innovative marketing campaign that will attempt to lure Scottish Rugby fans to their spiritual home for high-profile Hearts matches.

A Tynecastle spokesperson said: "We will be distributing over 35,000 emails over the next few days promoting Hearts' forthcoming games at Murrayfield to Scottish rugby fans.

"We know that many rugby fans have visited Murrayfield before and we would like them to join with Hearts and cheer the team through the Champions League, which is the world's premier club football competition."