Hearts in crisis: Club legend Gary Mackay breaks down in tears as he discovers beloved Jambos are going into administration

18 Jun 2013 07:39

Hugh Keevins

FORMER Tynecastle midfielder Mackay heard the news yesterday while on holiday in Tenerife and says the "hurt will mix with anger" over the "absurd" way Vladimir Romanov has run the club.

THERE were tears in Tenerife for Gary Mackay last night, and he doesn’t mind admitting it.

The plight of the football club the arch Jambo loves to the point of distraction made a grown man cry.

And why wouldn’t it when a professional lifetime was devoted to Tynecastle and the team for whom 49-year-old made 516 appearances over a 17-year period between 1980 and 1997?

But there was anger as well as Mackay festered over the way the Edinburgh club were driven into the ground.

When you’re the record holder for most competitive appearances at a club like Hearts you don’t take the institution you love going into administration lightly.

And last night Mackay was taking no prisoners as he started a holiday break left distraught by the news he was receiving from back home.

He said: “To be honest, I think I’m better off abroad under the circumstances.

“There will be tears for the Hearts when I have my glass of wine this evening because there has always been that emotional attachment to the club on my part.

“But the hurt will also mix with the anger I’m feeling over the circumstances that have forced the club to send for the administrator.”

Then Mackay started to give vent to his true feelings.

Understandably he started with Vladimir Romanov and the Lithuanian regime which has brought Tynecastle to its knees.

“Mackay added: “His running of the club has been absurd.

“People of my generation, and I’ll be 50 on my next birthday, have had a couple of great causes for celebration, like winning the Scottish Cup on penalties against Gretna and then taking five goals off Hibs in the final of the same competition.

“But since Romanov arrived that excitement has been mingled with a continual cause for concern over how the club was being run behind the scenes.

“You can trace that sense of uncertainty back to the day George Burley was got rid of from the manager’s office, and follow the trail all the way to the moment the administrator was sent for.

“Today we have the scenario where 7000 people have been implored to buy season tickets ahead of when they normally would make that financial commitment because the club needed the money to go on. They have been left the innocent victims of a total fabrication.

“There were assurances that Hearts had achieved a level of sustainability without the need for financial backing from Lithuania.

“But if that had truly been the case then the club wouldn’t have needed to apply to go into
administration, would it?

“Supporters have also been asked to buy shares in the club to ensure that sustainability and not one share certificate has been has been issued. People have been lied to and that leaves me distressed.

“The ordinary fans who have paid the money for season tickets and shares have been the ones left hardest hit, and that’s unfair.

“I hurt for the fans and I’m deeply concerned for Gary Locke and what he has in front of him as Hearts manager.”
Administration-hit Hearts fear they could be evicted from Tynecastle as Lithuanian firm seek to appoint own administrators

Mackay wants to see Hearts rediscover their identity as a club with dignity and a strong sense of pride.

And he wonders out loud if there are people currently working for the club who might find their consciences being troubled by the nagging thought that they could have done more to prevent yesterday’s dire development.

He said: “Could some people have been more pro-active or where they simply doing what they were told to do out of a fear for the consequences of taking any other course of action?

“But the certainty is the propaganda stops here and the start of the road back begins, however long it takes.

“There are going to be people who could find themselves out of work and a manager left with the hardest job in the country as far as staying in the SPL is concerned.”

Mackay had addressed the Hearts fans at a public meeting inside Tynecastle’s Gorgie Suite on Friday night. He told them he trusted the men running the Foundation of Hearts, now charged with leading the fight to restore the club in whatever shape it’s in after the administrator’s done his worst.

He said: “I told the fans I’d trust the people running the Foundation with my life. I told them I’d looked into the eyes of the chairman, MP Ian Murray, and sensed his passion for the Hearts. And I told them that the club is, was and always will be bigger than all of us.

“Now it’s about making sure we retain our pride in Hearts.

“The fans were actually told the crisis that’s now full blown was partly created by their hesitation over buying season tickets in sufficient numbers.

“Anyone inside the club who aligned themselves to that statement should be disgusted with themselves.”

Mackay and other former players involved in the day-to-day fight to
keep Hearts going recently handed over a cheque for £4000 so that much needed painting work could be carried out inside one part of Tynecastle.

When he comes back from Tenerife he’ll start all over again and raise what money he can, and do whatever else is possible, to carry out restoration work on the club’s reputation.

It will be one man’s labour of love.

Just like the tears that were shed by Mackay last night were one man’s demonstration of private grief.

Taken from the Daily Record