Romanov unrepentant as methods backfire

Heart of Midlothian’s owner was surfing the net not long after his threat to sell his team backfired. Not to Autotrader, but to post another message on the official Tynecastle website. This time the Lithuanian millionaire was not ranting at referees or the press, but stating his defiance that he will not be changing the methods that have hauled Hearts to the brink of civil war.

“I am on course and I am not going to be blown off,” Romanov declared. “I still believe in what I am doing and will complete the task. I know my methods surprise a lot of people in this country but I am committed to Hearts.”

Those methods were even more in doubt after Hearts spilt yet more points in the Bank of Scotland Premierleague title race. It was so simple, in Romanov’s eyes. Beat Dunfermline Athletic or you’re being shipped out to, err, Dunfermline. Romanov’s insult came back to bite him as the side that started the day joint-bottom secured a draw at Tynecastle. Oh, and just to rub salt into the wound, Dunfermline’s goal was scored by a former Hearts employee, or cast-off as they are known in the trade.

Jim Hamilton has more miles on him than a Moscow taxi driver, after playing for Dundee, Aberdeen, Dundee United, Dunfermline (twice), Ross County, Livingston and Motherwell. However, he is best known for his part in Hearts 1998 Scottish Cup triumph and scoring 40 goals in 105 games at Tynecastle — now there’s a statistic they will not be quoting about Edgaras Jankauskas when he finally leaves.

The former FC Porto striker, reportedly on £10,000 a week, came off the bench for Hearts as they chased a winner after Hamilton had silenced the raucous 17,000 Hearts crowd, and contributed nothing. The same could be said of the Lithuanian’s compatriot, Deividas Cesnauskis. Only Andrius Velicka of Romanov’s favoured sons could be said to be paying his way right now, after netting his fourth goal since his move from FBK Kaunas, Hearts’ feeder club which is also owned by Romanov.

Romanov began his climb up the ladder to fortune by selling Beatles records from his car boot in the Soviet Union days when capitalism was scorned. However, the Tynecastle owner cannot employ the same methods to deal with a squad of modern footballers. He may have enough for a car boot sale, with more than 30 professionals in the first-team squad, but the men who were the engine for Hearts last season — Craig Gordon, Steven Pressley and Paul Hartley — en route to the Tennent’s Scottish Cup success and securing Champions League football, deserve better than to be told “you’re out the door to Siberia, sorry East End Park”.

Despite their assurances to the contrary, the Tynecastle Three cannot have slept well on Friday night. The Hearts players in general were warned by Romanov that it would be the Gulag Archipelago if they did not take three points from Dunfermline, but in reality the trio of high-profile rebels who hijacked a press conference on Friday to reveal “significant dressing-room unrest” must have felt most vulnerable.

Revolt was in the air and come Saturday the Hearts supporters made their feelings known. The rebels had their names hoisted to the Tynecastle rafters by the fans, while Vladimir Romanov’s chant based on Puccini’s La donna e mobile suddenly had that feel of a No 1 that has stuck around too long that no one wants to even hear a note: think Bryan Adams or Wet, Wet, Wet and you get the picture.

Romanov sat there for a full half-hour before the game in the directors’ box, looking down on his empire. The subjects were not amused. Silence spoke volumes. However, he could be caught nodding along in time to Roxy Music’s Let’s Stick Together — you could not make it up if you tried.

Before the game, we even had Romanov’s public relations executive, Charlie Mann, telling the nation on BBC Radio Scotland that Romanov was “wrong to do what he did”. Mann added: “Romanov does not understand the Scottish way of doing things and there is a clash of cultures at work here. However, he will not be punishing the (rebel) players because he believes in freedom of speech and lived in a country where it was denied for so long.”

Those former Soviets are making up for lost time. Eduard Malofeev, the man who has replaced Valdas Ivanauskas temporarily after the head coach swapped a his dugout for a sick bed to combat stress, launched an impassioned defence of his employer and denied that Romanov’s empire was suffering from unrest.

“What happened?” queried the Hearts’ sporting director on BBC Radio Scotland. “Nothing happened. Everything is OK. Do you not have democracy in Scotland.” Later the voluble Russian insisted to a press conference that Romanov does not interfere with team selection, despite evidence to the contrary from the man himself. “I want to tell you that Vladimir was never interfering in any football matters,” Malofeev said through an interpreter. “I don’t know where this idea comes from. I’m the manager, I make the decisions. I can take advice from people but my word is the last word.”

The former Belarus national coach, who won the old Soviet Union league title with Dynamo Minsk and earned 40 caps for the USSR, could not resist tinkering any more than his boss. Malofeev used a 3-4-3 system that contained three defenders in the middle of the pitch instead of the usual 4-4-2 that has been so effective for Hearts in the last 14 months.

However, as every manager will tell you, the game is not about systems, it is about players. Hearts did not possess enough with genuine conviction after Hamilton bundled in a corner from Owen Morrison, perhaps with his hand which sparked such an impassioned protest from Gordon that he was booked.

The taunt of being sent to Dunfermline must surely have acted as reverse psychology for the Fifers, even if they denied it. A team that also lost its manager in midweek, when Jim Leishman moved back upstairs after a 4-0 thrashing by Hibernian, responded well and could have won the game had Mark Burchill — one of five former Hearts players in the visitors’ team — buried a late chance.

“Nobody needed to wind them up today,” Craig Robertson said when asked about Romanov’s jibe. “I asked the boys to give a performance of passion, workrate and football and they did. The guys showed great spirit to come back. We told them, whoever comes in, that is the standard they must reach every week.” If they don’t, they could all find themselves sold off to Hearts.

Heart of Midlothian (3-4-3): C Gordon 8 — C Berra 6, S Pressley 7, J Goncalves 6 — R Neilson 6, I Tall 5 (sub: J Brellier, 83min), P Hartley 8, L Wallace 7 — D Cesnauskis 4 (sub: B Aguiar, 77), A Velicka 7, R Bednar 4 (sub: E Jankauskas, 52 3). Substitutes not used: S Banks, T Fyssas, S Mikoliunas, M Zaliukas. Booked: Gordon, Neilson.

Dunfermline Athletic (4-4-2): R McKenzie 6 — J McCunnie 7 (sub: G Ross, 48 6), G Shields 8, A Tod 8, A Labonte 7 — D Young 7, S Simmons 7, G Mason 8 (sub: C Woods, 87), O Morrison 7 — J Hamilton 9, M Burchill 7 (sub: F Daquin, 82). Substitutes not used: G Paterson, S Bamba, S Morrison, I Williamson. Booked: Hamilton, Young.

'He runs the club like a Soviet sub'

GEORGE FOULKES the former chairman of Heart of Midlothian, yesterday claimed that Vladimir Romanov, the majority shareholder, “thinks he can run a football club like you run a Soviet submarine”, in reference to the club’s owner former life as a submarine commander.

Foulkes has come out on the side of the club’s disenchanted players after Steven Pressley, Craig Gordon and Paul Hartley had voiced their disquiet over Romanov’s regime on Friday. Foulkes believes the squad and the fans have good reason to be concerned at the continued unrest at Tynecastle.

“Romanov has been flexing his muscles rather more than is sensible,” he told BBC Radio Five Live’s Sportsweek programme. “Unfortunately, this has resulted in three Scotland internationals saying enough is enough.

“I sympathise with them because managers have been coming and going without any proper explanation. When Romanov became the majority shareholder, he thought he knew best and over the last year he has been interfering more and more. He has certainly put a lot of money into the club and shown a lot of interest, but he not shown a lot of sense or statesmanship.”

Romanov reportedly threatened to sell the players if they did not beat Dunfermline and Foulkes is fearful that if such a situation did occur the consequences would be dire for Hearts.

“To have a fire-sale of players like Gordon, who is certainly the best goalkeeper in Scotland, if not the United Kingdom, Pressley and Hartley has to be crazy,” he said. “Romanov is a bit like Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. The people around him are all ‘yes men’ or ‘yes women’. That is the difficulty.

“He used to be a submarine commander. He thinks he can run a football club as a Soviet submarine. The consequences are you can only really run a club of our kind with the commitment of the players and fans. Once the players get restless you do not get the kind of response that is sensible.

Taken from timesonline.co.uk