SPL charges Hearts with 'failing to behave with utmost good faith'

• SPL claims club last paid players on time in September
• Hearts deny they were late this month

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Ewan Murray
guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 17 January 2012 20.54 GMT
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Hearts say they will contest any sanctions imposed upon them by the SPL. Photograph: Murdo Macleod for the Guardian

The Scottish Premier League has charged Hearts with "failing to behave with the utmost good faith" over the delayed payment of player wages. The SPL had ordered Hearts to pay their players by Monday but some wages did not appear in bank accounts until Tuesday.

A group of 14 of the club's players had authorised their union to approach the SPL amid continued wage delays. Hearts last paid their players on the agreed payday, the 16th of the month, back in September.

Prior to Tuesday night's SPL board conference call, Hearts said in a statement: "The club has made payment of the remuneration to each of the players on 16th January 2012 and has documentary evidence to this effect."

Hearts will be summoned to a SPL hearing at which punishments available range from warnings and fines to points deductions and transfer embargoes. Sanctions at the lower end of that scale are anticipated although Hearts are sure to contest even that.

"The club has noted the decision of the SPL this evening and will defend its position at the appropriate time," read a Hearts statement released on Tuesday night.

Celtic have completed the pre-contract signing of the 24-year-old defender Jaroslaw Fojut from the Polish club Slask Wroclaw. Fojut, who spent five years at Bolton Wanderers between 2004 and 2009 but made a single first-team appearance, will move to Glasgow at the end of the season on a three-year contract.

"I think his all-round game is very good," said Celtic's manager, Neil Lennon. "He has been playing at a decent level of football from a young age but what I like about him is his physical qualities. He already knows the British game, so I don't think it will take him too long to adapt to the rigours of Scottish football."

Taken from the Guardian/Observer