Aguiar attacks athenian anguish

TONIGHT becomes second-chance Thursday for Bruno Aguiar as he endeavours to deliver full recompense to Hearts for the needless red card which impaired the team's last outing at Murrayfield.

The Portuguese admits to nursing an overhanging sense of guilt since his dismissal against AEK Athens last month, an aberration that had a hand in undermining the club's attempts to make their first foray into the euro-laden Champions League.

Aguiar incurred a second booking and subsequent suspension from the second leg in Athens when Danish referee Nicolai Vollquartz penalised him for throwing the ball away after an hour of the first leg. His side were 1-0 ahead at that point. Throughout the remaining 120 minutes of the two-legged tie, Hearts could only lament the absence of their tenacious midfielder as they succumbed to a 5-1 aggregate loss.

With the Champions League now out of everyone's system, Sparta Prague are next on the Murrayfield guest list. The UEFA Cup may exist as a little brother to its Champions League sibling, but an imperious display from Aguiar this evening would be welcome redress for his AEK misdemeanour.

The 25-year-old has recovered sufficiently from the calf strain that kept him out against St Mirren last weekend and is expected to start in a holding midfield role against the Czechs with Julien Brellier suspended and Marius Zaliukas cup-tied. Paul Hartley will assume his customary advanced role between midfield and attack as head coach Valdas Ivanauskas restores the central midfield combination he favoured during the closing weeks of last season.

Pointing to a strapping around his calf, Aguiar said: "I'm okay to play so it is down to Valdas [in typically Portuguese fashion, Aguiar refers to his head coach as Mr Valdas]. If he wants me to play, I can play. The strapping is just for protection.

"I try not to think about the match with Athens here and hopefully this game can help me forget it completely. It is another game in a new competition. I try to put old matches out of my memory once they are finished.

"This is an important game for us as a team because after losing to AEK we need to make sure we are in the groups for the UEFA Cup. Winning against Sparta will allow this to happen. We should think only about winning the match because we are the home team. If it ends 0-0 then it will be okay, because we will not have lost any goals and that is very important in a two-legged tie like this. But I feel we should be going for a victory."

Aguiar's 15 years on the books at Benfica - "the team of my heart," he says of the club he joined as a nine-year-old - saw him instilled with the kind of mulish resilience most players would kill for. That's precisely the quality he will require for this evening's attempt at exorcising the ghosts of AEK.

Told by Jose Mourinho that he was surplus to requirements during the current Chelsea manager's brief tenure at the Stadium of Light in 2001, the diminutive midfielder outlasted the Special One in Lisbon by returning from a loan spell to re-impose himself upon the Benfica squad.

He won the Portuguese SuperLiga under the legendary Italian Giovanni Trapattoni in 2005 and subsequently had Ronald Koeman as manager before departing for FBK Kaunas and Hearts in January. Continental influence, then, is not a department in which Aguiar can be found wanting and his wily wisdom channelled in the correct fashion is what Hearts will attempt to utilise in their tilt at the UEFA Cup group phase.

"I played in the Champions League groups and the UEFA Cup groups with Benfica so I have a little experience of the group phases," he says. "Tonight is a big, big game but all the players have confidence. I just want to win. I want to help Hearts become better in Europe and get used to playing in these group stages."

Whilst attending to his own European desires, which become all the more poignant as clubs from his homeland contemplate a possible FIFA ban from continental competition, Aguiar recognises the dangers posed by this evening's visitors. Sparta Prague are virtually guaranteed to proceed with caution as new coach Michal Bilek takes command for only the second match and his first ever in European competition as a manager. However, despite enduring a less than convincing start to their domestic season, the Czechs remain one of Europe's most reputable clubs with a number of full and under-21 interplayers from their national team.

Aguiar is likely to find himself in direct midfield confrontation with the crafty Czech internationalist Jan Simak, a former Hannover and Bayer Leverkusen player, who played against Ivanauskas in Germany. In attack, it is to be hoped Tomas Jun does not harbour any grudges after Hearts rejected the chance to sign him from Istanbul club Besiktas back in January. His scoring threat is augmented by that of the Swiss forward Mauro Lustrinelli and Sparta's two-goal hero from their weekend win over Tescoma Zlin, Libor Dosek.

Lustrinelli and the 6ft 6in Dosek are both expected to be restricted to substitute roles by Bilek as the head coach opts for a policy of containment but there are also a couple of not-so-secret weapons in the Hearts armoury, namely Roman Bednar and Michal Pospisil.

And whilst some supporters may believe playing at Murrayfield is detrimental to their side's chances of progressing in Europe, Aguiar insists on being strictly selfish for a moment when questioned on the subject. "I think, for my style of football, it is better to play here, although I will play in any stadium for Hearts," says the Portuguese.

"We have played three games here so we are getting used to it now. Tynecastle is a small pitch and is very different, but I enjoy the space at Murrayfield. I can play my game better and try to control the play."

The first instalment of two-legged European ties are usually noted for being cagey and constricted affairs, but Aguiar will go straight for Sparta's jugular this evening in his quest for retribution.

So much the better if his Hearts team-mates follow suit.

Probable Hearts team (4-4-2): Gordon; Neilson, Pressley, Berra, Fyssas; Beslija, Hartley, Aguiar, Cesnauskis; Bednar, Pinilla.

Taken from the Scotsman