Hearts frustrated by referee and flight delay

Hearts will go into today's Uefa Cup draw unseeded but also unbowed after their defeat by AEK Athens in the Champions League qualifiers, at least according to the players who returned to Edinburgh yesterday after a delayed flight home.

AEK's reward was a Champions League group place alongside AC Milan, Lille and Anderlecht while Hearts must now scrap through a home and away tie to reach the group format of the lesser competition. They will be have to take the field in their next European game without Julien Brellier and Neil McCann, who were sent off in Athens as Hearts strove to overturn a 2-1 deficit from the first leg. Even when reduced to 10 men Hearts still kept the issue in balance but when they were down to nine the matter became academic, all the more so when AEK scored three times in the closing minutes to register a crushing 5-1 aggregate.

There was anger among the Hearts squad on their protracted return - a computer breakdown at Athens airport meant the travelling party had to be checked on laboriously by hand - and some of the opinions expressed about the performance of the Russian referee, Iourie Baskakov, had better remain private. The main source of contention was Brellier's dismissal. He was booked when the referee spotted he was sporting an ear stud, then cautioned again for an innocuous challenge on Vladimir Ivic.

Some responsibility for his jewellery infringement must be borne by Brellier himself and the Hearts backroom staff because it has been known that the prohibitions on such items had become more stringent. However, Baskakov's contribution did not bear scrutiny, the referee having permitted AEK players to wear rings and other items, evidently without sanction, although the anomaly was pointed out to him by the Hearts captain, Steven Pressley.

Craig Gordon, the Hearts goalkeeper, reviewed the previous evening's events with a mixture of pragmatism and frustration when he said: "We knew that this year there would be a crackdown on jewellery. We were told beforehand. And it was probably Julien's responsibility - but also the officials' job, too. It seems heavy handed but there you are. "

What annoyed us was that one or two of their players were wearing jewellery but nothing was done about that."

Taken from telegraph.co.uk