The Vlad giveth and the Vlad taketh away

The last few weeks have been nothing but positivity and stability, all relative of course but none the less, positive and stable. Since the home defeat to Celtic, Hearts have been turning in fairly solid, completely uninspiring mind you but solid performances.


Clean sheets all the way! I for one will never argue with that, get your defence sorted out and solid and mean and the midfield/attack will feed from that - confidence in a solid defensive setup will lead to fluency and expression in midfield and the strikers will start banging them in. Well if you have got the players who can of course, the jury is out.


When i was a kid, Liverpool were my English team, no doubt seduced by the outrageous success, never going to get that from Hearts! Some time in the late eighties however i got bored with their machine like prowess and switched my allegiance to Arsenal. "1 nil to the Arsenal" suits me just fine when the need arises. I would be happy enough with 1 nil victories for Hearts between now and the end of the season, who of us would not?





The transfer window until very recently has been quietly positive, a couple of what look like decent signings coming in on the - now familiar 6 month loan first refusal on a longer contract if it works out. I wonder how many other teams adopt a similar signing policy, it is certainly not common in Scotland or as far as i can see the rest of the UK. From the word go, before the start of 2005 - 2006 season i saw this as a sensible even wily and astute policy. It strikes me that it is an almost zero risk means of bringing a number of new players into an inevitably volatile environment, selecting those who make it and dismissing those that don't with no real repercussions. This has worked for Hearts, with a good few players who have moved from the loan to the contract ( and those contracts tend to be long ) best example would be Roman Bednar. I would imagine Zaliukas, possibly Velicka will also move onto the longer term deal. Others who haven't made it are moved on, Tiago Costa etc.





Then came the long awaited and fantastic news that planning permission for the new 12,000 seater main stand has moved onto the next stage, with Hearts given permission to buy the required land to go ahead with the development.


We have waited a while now, this really has been the acid tests of Vlad's sincerity, his goals and ultimate plans and ambitions for our team. Back at the start of the season when things were once again going from frying pan to roundabout, Hearts made an official statement that plans for the new stand would be in by February. For me at least i have been accepting almost anything that has gone on at Tynecastle so long as that statement became reality. Close to the wire but this week saw us draw ever closer to the goal of a revamped Tynecastle park a home for our team for another 100 hundred years - i can't think of anything more important for the team.


One of the pics i have seen of what we may be looking forward to in a few years -

I don't hold with the argument that there is no point having a stadium if the team is crap, we will always be able to build a decent team and i am absolutely certain that we will have a better chance of realising our ambitions when we are playing in a stadium that lives up to those ambitions. This pic looks like the 30,000 seater stadium with the new stand and the corners filled in either side of the Roseburn stand. With a realistic head on that is where i would pitch my ambitions, 40,000 just seems too much of a leap to me - ask me again in 5 years.
In any case we should hopefully have heard the last of "flats flats glorious flats" for a while.

Things have been going in the right direction for so long now that the word "Believe" has once again entered the Jambo vocabulary. Long being the Hearts long ofcourse, which is nothing like anyone elses long and is a bit more like "a tiny wee short time".

So this week has been stable and positive on the run up to the seminal game at Ibrox on Saturday. It was with no surprise then that we shot ourselves in the both feet on Friday.
Valdas Ivanauskas admits that there are a number of Hearts players who have been attracting interest from others and that Hearts are in negotiations with those parties. Paul Hartley and Craig Gordon were then dropped for the game at Ibrox - with reports of football politics or football business as the reason, standard garbled English from Hearts.
It is not clear why Gordon was dropped, he has made it quite clear that he would be happy to stay at Tynecastle for now at least, so if Hearts are looking to cash in on his value it should not have affected his ability to play for the team. Hartley is a different story in that he may himself be Ibrox bound, so his not playing at Ibrox is no surprise. Selling Hartley to either of the gruesome twosome will upset and disturb many Hearts supporters. We have all believed that one of the major plus points of having Vlad around is his dislike for the Old Firm, their duopoly! Hence he gives the impression at least that he would not wish to do business with them. Selling one of our best players then to Rangers will signal a reversal of this stance and serve to reduce our belief in his oft stated lofty ambitions. If the deal goes through with Rangers, Hearts will have offloaded two of the Riccarton 3, one each to the ugly sisters. Regardless of anything else this can only be seen as battles lost by Vlad and Hearts in their war against the dominance of the Old Firm. More, from an objective viewpoint it can be seen as not much other than strategic errors on the part of General Romanov.
That said, Hearts have had the best years of Paul Hartley and i am not against selling him if the money is right, would much rather it was to an English outfit however. We shall see.

So with the media frenzy aiming it's sights firmly in the direction of the Tynecastle circus, hearts turned up at Ibrox for a game which would go a very long way to deciding the rest of the season for Hearts at least. A win for Rangers would provide them 8 points of clear water over Hearts in the race for 2nd place and the Champions League spot. A win for hearts reducing that to 2 points and game on.
It is a completely different Rangers team ofcourse, however it is perhaps telling that they now have instilled in their ranks two of the stalwarts of their nine-in-a-row years. Walter Smith back at the helm and Ally McMoist as his 2nd in command. During those years, Rangers regularly killed off Celtics challenges by drawing with them when Celtic really needed the win.
For Rangers then 5 points ahead of Hearts, a draw is much more useful than it is to Hearts. That said after a fairly dominant 2nd half by the home team Hearts were definitely the happier to leave Ibrox with the point gained and no ground lost, to Rangers at least. Both Hibs and Aberdeen winning has brought the 4 tighter than they have been for a good few weeks now.

The game itself is not worth dwelling on, a fairly even first half where quality was low and efforts relatively few and far between was replaced by a 2nd half of dominance by Rangers and rearguard action supplemented by hit on the break tactics by Hearts.
Rangers had the ball in the back of the net but Barry Ferguson's effort was chalked off for offside.
A couple of other efforts by Rangers came close but really i prefer to see this one as further evidence of Hearts meanness in defence than anything else.

Scottish cup next week, away to Dunfermline - i have a funny feeling!

HOOOO ON THE JAMBOS

Tougher than watching Hearts

There are times when i watch Currie Star under tens when i get really worked up and frustrated - illogically affected by the events on the park. Today was one of those days, i swear there are times when it is worse than watching Hearts.
I can see this as pathologically insane given that my youngest is never up nor down with whatever result they get - he even appreciates the humour in taking a good tanking.
Obviously a far more balanced and emotionally mature individual than his auld man!

Don't get me wrong i am not one of those, parents who are so partisan that they can't see past there own kid and their kids team. I can appreciate the opposition, i can even applaud their play when i think it merits praise. Neither am i one of those infurating eejits who can only bark criticism at their poor offspring, like it is some kind of vindication that they once were pretty good at the game themselves and now can't understand how any child of theirs could be so terrible.

Currie Star played Beechwood today, but save for ten minutes or so either side of the half they were never really in the game. Beechwood moved into a 3 - 0 lead too easily within 20 minutes of the start. Currie Star just didn't seem to be concentrating.
Thankfully they switched on for a bit before the half time whistle and pulled a goal back, a fine run down the right and the ball squared into the centre for a classic strikers goal. For a while at least the lads looked as though they could get back into the game. Another lapse in concentration however allowed Beechwood in again and the game was pretty much lost from then on.
Star managed to get 3 goals to their credit but lost a further 3 to go down 7 - 3 in the end.

A tough defeat to take today, 7 - 3 did not flatter Beechwood but really 3 or 4 of their goals should never have happened.
Keep the heads up lads, training should start again soon so you should be able to get back to winning ways in a few weeks.

Laryea Kingston

Will he sign for Hearts, is he any good.
Not sure about either after watching this .....

100mpg

As ever, i was looking forward to the Falkirk game. Like when we play Kilmarnock my opinion is firmly in the - this should be a good game, corner. This is good because it has nothing to do with ancient rivalries - the Hibs, the Celtic or the Ra-angers, or more modern equivalences Aberdeen or as the world used to be Dundee Utd. I have enjoyed playing Falkirk over the past few seasons because - they play decent football at you and the have a fairly healthy disrespect for all comers.
So i was looking forward to a good game, had predicted an optimistic 3 - 1 to the good guys.

For the vast majority of the game however you could have gotten the full 100 miles to the gallon, given the woefully low octane content. The opposite of what i wanted or expected.

After this one i am left with the understanding that Hearts are a bit of a multi-dimensional jigsaw puzzle - we can't seem to get all parts of the team playing well at the same time or if we can, only for short tantalising periods in the game, before it all degenerates to a box full of mixed up bits that don't fit together.

There was an offer during the week of 2.5 million for Craig Gordon, i have not been his biggest fan of late but i think we should expect to command a fair whack more than that for him. Were Fulham just chancing there arm? see if we are in a more precarious financial position than outwardly apparent, ready to jump at the first 7 figure offer. The offer was firmly rejected by HMFC with the retort - you better be ready to part with £10M. So by the laws of the barter that means we will sell for £6M or there abouts - i believe we will sell for less than that however.
Interested to see that on MOTD on Saturday morning, celebrating the anniversary of some mental French plan to have a combined Franco - UK national team, back in the fifties or something like that. Maybe some post war act of fraternity, who knows surely not some plan to improve the French team. Any roads the only Scot that made it near the team was none other than our very own Craig soon to be gazillionaire Gordon. Fantastic! but i suppose they had to have 1 Scot and who else could it possibly have been!
Craig hurt his groin early in the week so was left out for Steve Banks, absolutely no conjecture by the media whatsoever that this had anything to do with transfer speculation or club/player turmoil so i guess there were no rumours/speculation to that effect. Has the media finally started to bore itself with the Tynecastle circus?
Transfer dealings at the moment seem more down to earth, sensible and realistic, i would go as far as to say relaxed if you get my drift. The players being mentioned, appear in any case to be, an enhancement rather than simply an augmentation to the squad. Still plenty of time for the mad final day flurry though.
Gogita Gogua and Laryea Kingston being the two most likely enhancements both of which would bring something to the team. Both do seem to have a bit of a history of combustion though but both also seem to be hand picked for their ability to handle the rigours of a frenetic SPL.
Looks to most of us supporters that we also really need a striker who is consistently going to put the ball in the proverbial onion bag, not much sign as yet in this transfer window. With Panilla and Makela both leaving our extended options are not looking too good in that department.

Hearts started the game in fairly good fettle with most if not all pieces of the jigsaw in place at the same time, it did not last long however as Hearts lapsed back to a long ball game which looked to me to be designed to reserve energy. Maybe i am reading between the lines here, last week against Celtic, Hearts were found out to have a serious problem pacing themselves through the game, looking almost out on their feet by half time. Don't the best teams play in phases of containment and punishment, conscious decisions to move through the gears as they navigate their way to victory. If only i could view a Hearts game like that!
I don't watch Falkirk that often of course so i don't really know but it seemed to me that their problem was where they were playing Russel Latapy, too far forward. He seems to do his best work these days in a deep midfield role where he can dictate the pace and flow of the game from the generals position up on the hill. He still seemed to have that magical ability to find the only pocket of space on the park at any one time though, the rest of his team always knew exactly where he was as well. To Falkirk's detriment he was closed down just that wee bit too quickly to be used to maximum effect.
Falkirk had the first decent chance a cross from the right headed goal ward and very well saved by Banks, palmed out to Falkirk front man only to be headed narrowly wide. This was countered quickly by some great work by Paul Hartley to move towards the box taking three defenders with him, he squared to Salius Mikoliunas who lashed a shot which crashed off the bar.
This brought a disappointing half to a close.
HMFC 0
Farlirk 0

Wish i could say that the second half was better but it wasn't, the only solace being that Ivanauskas's substitutions worked! Andrew Driver was brought on for Mikoliunas. Miko had had a decent enough game and i hope that his many detractors are keeping themselves very quiet at the moment, but he should take a look at the run Driver made for the goal. If Miko can add that kind of run to his game Miko and it will transform him as a player. Roman Bednar came on for the ineffectual Jamie Mole, i spent the next 15 minutes lambasting him for his complete lack of ability to get a head to a ball. Really though this is Ivanauskas's fault, this is not Bednar's game so why do we persevere with it when he is on the park. He was far more comfortable and effective with balls knocked down the channel than a Gary Owen coming down on him from the heaven's. He was also much more effective for the goal.
Driver collected the ball on the right just at the edge of the box, he put his head down, knocked the ball past the defender and made for the bye line where he knocked a low ball to the near post and towards where Bednar and two Falkirk defenders were thundering. It just doesn't get simpler, a bit of pace on the wing, a decent predatory striker and you get a very good return for that move. Hearts scored about 40% of their goals from that last season with low balls knocked in from the byline, that is only about the third we have scored in that fashion this year.
The game appeared to be concluding in a hard fought and just about deserved 1 - 0 win when it exploded in a melee and sending off for Falkirk's Darren Barr for his reaction to Andrius velicka's foul. There have been many recriminations and brandings of cheat for Velicka's part, so much so that i am doubting what i saw. Firstly the tackle by Velicka was a disgrace, it was more just a petulant lash out than any attempt to tackle, pretty close to a straight red itself. My immediate reaction to the response by Barr was - "Send that eejit off", seemed to me that there was contact, arms were raised and Velicka fell to the floor. Nobody else in the world though seems to think that there was any contact at all. Apart from, the ref and my 14 year old who both seem to agree that a head butt was the reason for dismissal?
Don't know, pretty sure Velicka has a lot to answer for. Now there was a lot of teeth gnashing, comments of racism against Hearts Lithuanian players aimed at the media, who all have gone down the no contact, Velicka's a cheat route.
I will not defend Velicka.
Tell you what though, this has gone on for as long as i can remember, it has nothing to do with Lithuanians per say could be any nationality outside of dear old blitey. The British punditry have a pathological inability to see UK born players as anything other than fundamentally fair minded and honest gentlemen, the opposite being true of all non UK players, each of whom will whenever is necessary adopt any and all underhanded and unsporting tactics available. Only Johnny foreigner could do such a thing!

I have played like that for years

This morning, early this cold damp morning at an almost waterlogged Kingsknowe the featured event was the return of under tens football for Currie Star.
First drama cascaded off the pitch as my boy, resplendent in his brand new Toto 90's had moments earlier scrambled out the car and run the 200 yards to the pitch. We sat in the car eeking out the last of the warmth for a while and watched guiltily as other mummys and dummys helped to put up the goals. Within a couple of moments he was back at the car, as he opened the door, he exclaimed "They have given me two left feet !?!"
If i had time to think about it i would have retorted "i have played with two left feet my whole life, ching ching!"
Sure enough two left footed Toto 90's and i recall the purchase the day before, we arrived at JJB Sports, Hermiston gate at 5:58 - 2 minutes before it shut, earliest i could get there after the Falkirk game. One pair of size 4, shiny silver and maroon Toto 90's in the sale 1 tenner. Jobs a good un!

We raced back to the house and for once in a month of Sundays, his brothers old boots size 41/2 were right at the front of the black hole of Calcutta - i mean the shoe cupboard. Got back up to Kingsknowe just as the game was kicking off, no subs so straight into the action.

First game since early December so it was understandable that things were a bit rusty and they were for the first 5 minutes or so. The game was against the old enemy and frequent adversaries Currie Boys ( and girls in this case ). Both sides took time to settle into a game but it was Currie Star who eventually settled first and imposed themselves on the game, resulting in the first goal, a fine strike from 15 yards out.
From that point on though it was a struggle for Currie Star, many references to too many christmas pies and too many left feet out there. Currie Boys equalised just before the half time and took a 2 - 1 lead shortly after half time. They kept that lead to the end. Currie Star were never out of it but equally Currie boys had chances to extend their lead.
Looked like the boys are needing to get back onto the training ground to bring back the improvements that were made before the break and i am sure they will.

Went back to JJB sports earlier this afternoon and those f***ers refused to give me a refund on the boots. Because they have been worn apparently, aye for all of two minutes!
Got to say i lost the plot a bit in there, apparently the young assistant manager was shaking with fear according to my daughter. My reaction to their refusal to refund was immediate, started as "Don't be bloody ridiculous you sold me two left feet!!" and just kind of degenerated from there.
The manager of the shop, who was not on duty ofcourse is due to call me tomorrow to sort it out.. i await her call.

trial

Trying an embedded audio player, sure you will like the toon tho.

Kick it Out

I would like to dedicate this blog entry to www.kickitout.org just because i feel like it, any kind of ism really it's about time it just all disappeared never to rear it's ugliness again.

Maybe as a Jambo with Celtic coming to town you take a bit more notice of the goings on in the crowd, i did, i took notice.
Make no mistake i am not about to pontificate that the Hearts support is - to a man angelic and devoid of ism's, i am not!
Neither will i see the opposition's antics through a fetid rage red mist, i will try not to.
But as a mark of the passing times i will state here for the record what i saw and heard at Tynecastle yesterday, in the shape of bigotry and racism as it descended from the stands.

I saw exactly one Union Jack in the Hearts support, it fluttered about aimlessly in the Roseburn Stand. You can argue that the display of the Union Jack is not in itself an act of bigotry. It's not! But it has more of an affiliation to that bigotry laden ideology, we all know and hate than it does to Heart of Midlothian Football Club.
There were exactly zero renditions of any billy boy, anti catholic songs that i heard from the Hearts support. There were at least three renditions of that number where the Celtic support give it - "mumble mumble ( do they even know the words until they get to ) SOLDIERS ARE WE mumble mumble" I don't even know if that song has been classified as racist or bigoted by UEFA or whoever but for the same reason as the Union Jack it has got to go. Each rendition had an uptake rate of exactly 100% of the Celtic support. Each time the effort was drowned out by a cacophony of boos from the Hearts quarters.
For the last ten minutes of the game the same 100% of celtic support belted out "Oh the wee Huns are Shi-ite" the Hearts support by then did not have the energy to respond.
There were a few TriColours but not many.
Behind me i kept hearing this bloke shout "f'n Chink" everytime Nakamura done anything remotely interesting with the ball ( not very often ). The saddest thing about that is, for the first half dozen times he said it, i heard 'Tink' not 'Chink' - see how far those dark decades of the seventies, eighties and nineties thrust the stereotypes into my Psyche. My kids will not suffer the same level of indoctrination but the above litany of useless crap is too much still -
It is time to stop!
None of the above bothered me in the slightest, apart from the "wee huns are shi-ite" but that had nothing to do with being deeply offended by an attack on hunness and everything to do with the fact that we had once again threw away a lead against Celtic and they were far far far too happy with themselves. My conscience is truly blunted to expressions of bigotry but just because i don't recoil in horror in the face of such horror does not mean i don't recognise it as horrible.
It is time to stop!
Rant over.

So the game had a big billing - it was the return of Steven Pressley to Tynecastle after the acrimonious divorce of captain from club late last year. Ever the optimist there was another agenda in my mind. For me the game was the leagues last chance saloon :-

If Hearts could get a result against the run away champions
and
after the other ugly sister won 5 - 0 against Dundee Utd having clutched at their straw and brought back Scotland manager and 9 in a row hero Walter Smith, Rangers go on a bit of a run.
Maybe the league was not all over.

The longest of long shots i know and even for me this was the very last chance for a wobble to be introduced that might just turn into a tailspin.
Sounds crazy but if you saw the final of the darts championship that went on yesterday in some working mans club in deepest darkest England, you'll know that it is never over till it's over.
The favourite goes 6 sets to 0 up in a first to 7 set final against the 150 - 1 outsider, who then claws his way back to 6 sets each and had the favourite f'n and blindin at himself. The favourite cruelly dispatched the final set 3 - 0. But there you go never over til the fat man flings the arrows.

The Steven Pressley show?
I mentioned in an earlier blog that i would be happy for Pressley to be applauded onto the park on his return to Tynecastle then to receive the same pelters as all the rest of the enemy from that point on. Have to say though that the minute i saw him emerge from the tunnel in the black and green of Celtic's away strip i saw no connection to me. I just saw a member of the opposition, the bad guys, someone who was to be castigated and vilified for the next 90 minutes or so. So did the rest of the Hearts support - so if you have read that he was applauded onto the pitch by the Hearts support that is a myth.
How did he play, he played pretty well within himself for the most part, after all he is a centre half not exactly the most expressive of positions. He commited the same niggly fouls he used to do for us, he organised and motivated the back 4 pretty well, he made a couple of well timed and important challenges and he got found out for pace and mobility a couple of times. All in all i think he just played a mature professional game and was not affected either way by the circumstances. A couple of points, having won the toss he made Heart shoot to the Gorgie end first ( always annoys us when it happens ), he looked livelier than usual when he came up for corners.
To sum it up, it is obvious that if there were any lingering emotions he hid them well and just got on with it, and that just makes perfect sense. Any one who has ever played any team sport knows it takes only seconds to develop an affiliation to your team exactly as long as it takes to pull on the team colours. It is to my deep regret that the only two Sunday league teams i have played for played in Green, White & Gold and Red, White & Blue - once the strip was on though i was one of them 100%.
A little aside - the Green, White & Gold was a team called Albion Park, i was 21 and they were coached by Mickey Weir and his brother. That wee sh*te was truly full of himself! I may never have been anywhere near his level of football but when you are fit and twenty one and a Hearts supporter you take great pleasure in catching a wee Hibee sh*t like him, crunching the tackles in. The beautiful game indeed.
So Pressley took great pleasure in the victory it was obvious and why shouldn't he, from our perspective we seem better of now that he is gone, we seem more settled and focused. So everyones a winner. I hope though that that is it now, no more lingering threads connecting him to us - no longer wish to read about Pressley the ex Hearts talisman forced to quit and join etc etc etc.

Hearts started the game in fiery spirit, and set about their task of outgunning Celtic all over the park in good fashion. For such a massive squad the line up looked somewhat makeshift - Brellier injured and Aguair suspended, we had to make do with Driver on the left and Neil McCann inside in central midfield. McCann much vilified, actually had a decent first half, putting himself about in midfield ( struck me that he was putting tackles in because he didn't have the time to think about it and ... bottle it like normal ). Barasa was performing his usual thuggery in the right back berth but managed to nobble himself somehow and had to go off to be replaced by Tall around 20 minutes, Tall doesn't seem to be cutting it for me and maybe their second goal would have been stopped if Barasa/Neilson had been there. Much gusto by Hearts had Celtic on the rack without really looking like they would buckle, we seemed to be short on ideas for the final ball. When Bednar played it square to Miko 30 yards out with the full compliment of Celtics defence stationed between him and goal then, we remained seated wondering what final ball failure he was about to conjure. I love it when a plan comes together, Miko has been very good at lulling the opposition into a false sense of security, no one in the Celtic defense thought for a second that they were in any danger of a venomous netbound shot from the wee Lithuanian. One step in with the left and he unleashed an unstoppable left foot pearler into the net with Boruc stranded and helpless.
A screamer!
Hearts had a chance to make it two close to half time with a neat ball through to Driver who took the defense for pace and sent a decent effort well saved by Boruc but only as far as Velicka to head back in a a goal mouth scramble which left us all confused and breathless. When i saw the pictures later on the TV it was never over the line but a good goal mouth clearance from Telfer.
Maybe if that had gone in things would have been different. Not convinced Celtic had featured in the Hearts box at this time, but a great effort low to Gordons left was saved perfectly - Half time.
Hearts 1
Celtic 0

My half time comment other than waxing lyrical over Miko's strike was to say "we have put an awful lot into the game i worry about the last twenty minutes.
In real terms it was the last 45 that i had to be worried about. The proverbial game of two halves!
Shortly after the interval Driver was taken off to be replaced by Elliot, playing out of position in midfield, and McCann moved out to his normal berth where Driver had been. Heard later that Driver was ill and probably should not have played at all, ill or otherwise had lost a degree of drive when he left the park.
The ball was out! a clear foot over the line on the half just below the Wheatfield Stand, the linesman ignored and Celtic retained possession, which they kept for another 10 or 15 seconds as they navigated their way into the Hearts box and set a drive towards Gordon. It was a hard shot but Gordon spilled - is it my imagination or is there a conspiracy of silence when Gordon makes a mistake, not just amongst Hearts supporters but all in Scottish football. He seems to be being treated like porcelain. Mind you if his infallible reputation keeps his price maximised then how can i argue with that!
Yan Venegoor of Castlemilk netted the rebound.
I was gutted, the ball was out man, frustrated!
Hearts forced a number of corners in the second half but frustratingly the quality of ball in was just not good enough always too long, too high and too predictable, so we never came close. I would like to see the stats on Hearts goals from corners this year, i bet it is very low.
The killer came from Jarosik, he collected the ball on the left and seemed to take Tall with him inside with out the challenge going in, he hit an effort which i thought was Gordon's all the way until it went in, i guess it bobbled over his hands, bouncing just in front of him.
Que the Celtic support and a rendition of "Thats why were champions" to the tune that we used to sing "Vladimir Romanov" to - like i said they were far too happy with themselves.
Hearts probably deserved a draw out of the game but from the point we went behind we never really looked like we believed we could get things back even. Celtic on the other hand always looked like they believed they could take the game and i guess that indeed is "why they are champions"

Goliath normally gives David a kicking

The game at Starks Park yesterday between lowly Stranraer and Heart of Midlothian was a no win scenario for Hearts in the best sense of the tradition. Hearts however managed to come out of it unscathed and i guess if you look at the result, comfortable.
It was a game in which Hearts could only lose, i mean credibility, hope, faith, revival, the game of course, team spirit, calmed waters etc etc etc. So to come back to Edinburgh with a 4 - 0 win was as good as we could have hoped for.

The Scottish Cup has never really held the same 3rd round giant killing romance of our southern junior version. The annual trotting out of remember Hereford Utd and the never to be forgotten last minute 30 yard mud slinging hoof to humble Newcastle in 19-canteen.
In Scotland acts of giant killing are not seen as romantic, we view those events more as a national disgrace - how Inverness Caledonian Thistle could have the bare faced ignorance to win a cup game against the mighty Glasgow Celtic and in Glasgow no less. This was viewed more as Celtic's disgrace than Caley's triumph. Mind you that game did result in the greatest football headline in the history of headlines -
SuperCaleyGoBallisticCelticAreAtroscious
A similar event many moons before where Rangers beat Rangers, that's Berwick beat Glasgow is also remembered as one of the lowest points in the history of that particular institution. Maybe in Berwick it is remembered as their greatest moment but there are only about 5 of them.
Even the current Glasgow Rangers don't look like they will challenge that particular disgrace, mind you that's mostly because they won't be playing any lower division opponents for the rest of the season - Rangers having now gone out of both domestic cup competitions.

I watched the Tamworth FC versus Norwich City game on the box yesterday lunchtime, hoping to grab a piece of that fabled romance. An extra sprinkling of desire on my part given the nickname of Tamworth - The Lambs, why should that matter?
It was not to be however after an decent start where if they had scored it may all have been different for The Lambs, Norwich sporting an ever ageing Dion Dublin, muscled into a 2 - 0 half time lead. A quick 3rd after the break and Tamworth were a beaten and broken team. The game ended at 4 - 1 to Norwich, so at least Tamworth got a consolation goal. Unfortunately for Stranraer they could not quite manage that.

I am again frustrated at the press continuing to bleat on about the ever changing Hearts team being an indication of some underlying cancer within the football club. If ever there was a game where wholesale changes were the order of the day it was this one. In fact if anything i was surprised that the team was so full of first team regulars if there can be such a thing in a Hearts line up. With so many players getting a game for Hearts this season when one goes out and another comes your standard Hearts supporter is no longer batting an eyelid. Looking back now at those dark days of the autumn it was never really the continual changes that was the problem for us it was more playing players out of position and just not playing the best players we had.
The perfect example of that being playing Zaliukas in midfield instead of Brellier, which now that we all know Zaliukas to be a decent centre back seems criminally insane to most with half a brain. With so many first team regulars in the team to face Stanraer we can only conclude that Hearts are serious about retaining The Scottish Cup and what can i say other than fantastic another storming cup run would be wonderful for us all.

The difference between the two teams was the simplest to quantify, superior quality in front of goal. Hearts did not really get out of 2nd gear and Stranraer had a chance or two to get into the game but Hearts took the chances that came their way and never really looked in any danger of flirting with the banana skin. A Velicka hatrick was under played by the striker when in the after match interview he mentioned that he once scored 7 in a league game for Kaunas. I would like Andrius to relax and remember that number and for the Scottish players at Hearts to explain to him that the combination of 7 goals in one game and Hibs has a certain romance to it.
Immortality.
Roman Bednar came on for Pospisil to to pick up the third goal in the four, which Ivanauskas is reported to be the happiest about. Ivanauskas is clearly a fan of Bednar and given he has signed a 5 year contract looks to be more of a fixture than most at Tynecastle, we should all be happy to see him progress. Not so sure though, injury prone or whatever as Bednar comes back to full fitness and back into the team he really needs to step it up a level this time round.
Hearts have both halves of the gruesome twosome in the next few weeks so the opportunities are there for the taking.

Calm waters

Happy New Year Folks

How happy is it from a Jambo perspective, it is pretty happy i guess.
We dispensed with Hibs on boxing day hey hey, right!
John Collins is reported to have 'allegedly' called Hearts a 'pub team', upset at the goings on during the derby defeat maybe, and he is young and new to the game etc so can be forgiven for a lack of diplomacy under pressure? He has however come out of the whole thing looking less than when he went in. You could not say that the honeymoon period is over for JC but he is for sure tarnished - like the top of the Usher Hall, no longer shiny bright copper, now looking dulled and the green is of the primordial soup slimy variety. The shine on the theatre didn't last long either.

When Hibs equalised at Tynecastle on boxing day, i had my head in my hands firm in my conviction that we were in the process of blowing the game in the most embarrassing of ways, so i did not see the Dean Shiels incident. Just the aftermath melee.
I did watch the incident a couple of times on the TV later. Got to say i have a bit of sympathy for him. It was always going to be a red card, it is always a red card. To attempt to have the card rescinded is not just churlish but insulting to just about every other red card that has ever been dished. You just don't get to raise your arms and clatter into an opposing player without getting sent off. But. There is only one explanation for Shiels actions - he was attempting to get the ball as quickly as possible in that traditionally tactic of attempting to keep the game going and so keep momentum with Hibs who were in the ascendancy. Regardless of whether that tactic would have actually worked or not, given that the ball now belonged to Hearts who could slow the game down as much as the ref would allow them ( should they have wanted to of course, not sure if they would have ). That is what Shiels was attempting to do. So he ran straight for the goal flush with the adrenalin injection of having just scored the equaliser. Gordon is a big bloke, not just in height but he is also about 8ft between shoulder blades. Add that to the fact that he did not stumble to his feet, he rose up from the ground like a colossus immediately in front of Shiels. Looked to me like it was the classic flight or fight instinct that flew through Dean Shiels mind in the available nano seconds, just enough time for him to raise his arms to protect himself from the imminent collision with something much bigger than him that had suddenly appeared out of nowhere.
Controversial coming from a Jambo i guess but there you go that's how i saw it.

Hearts then managed a draw away to Killie, tricky in any ones book - but recapping the game in my head and i visualise Hearts were unfortunate not to capitalise or is that guilty of not converting a good few chances to win the game. Still for me to sit here right now and bemoan the fact that we have too many away draws is to venture back to the halcyon days of last years league campaign. Mind you by exactly this time last year Hearts had lost 3 - 2 to Celtic after being 2 up at Tynecastle -
Hearts threw out the league with the bath water on that day. Was that the catalyst for the turmoil that has afflicted the club over the past 3 or 4 months - NO don't think so.

Yesterday Hearts managed a 1 - 0 away win against Dunfermline. In a game where we should have been 3 or 4 up by half time but in the end had to hold out to retain the precious lead.
Callum Elliot returned after his time on loan to Motherwell, this was good to see but the question remains, why did we ever send him over there in the first place. I guess the power(s) that be at Tynecastle must have thought we had a glut of striking prowess and therefore his time would be better spent gaining first team football somewhere else. Seemed crazy then and seems even more so now.
Striking prowess remains the most obvious problem for Hearts at the moment with no one managing to string together a run of games which include goals. Can't help thinking that it is still the perennial quality of ball into the box, that is the real problem.

For all that, and after all the madness and disruption at Heart of Midlothian Football Club since the start of this season for a time during the match yesterday, if results had remained as they were Hearts would have finished the day in 2nd place. Bizarre and a giant up ye to all those who serve to promote the problems we have as if that was a useful thing to do.
Yesterday Steven Pressley played his first game for Celtic after leaving Hearts, we would all have liked to have wished Elvis the very best for the future but playing for the one team that everyone must beat leaves us in a difficult position.
Celtic come to Tynecastle in a couple of weeks, it would be good if the Hearts support were to give him a good welcome maybe even one last rendition of 'theres only one Steven Pressley' then from the minute his first challenge goes in against us we immediately and berate him just like the rest of the bad guys.
In any case i sense a bit of closure over the whole affair and for that Hearts are in a healthier position than we have been since, the start of the season.
Rangers on the other hand are looking in disarray after the removal of the captaincy from Barry Ferguson, dropped too there are many reports that he has played his last game for Rangers. There are a lot of similarities here between the Pressley and Ferguson situation. The new regimes clearing out the old order so they can move forward in creating the new power base.
So for Hearts we the keel has steadied and the waters ahead look calm, for now at least the storm clouds have cleared. That storm started from the minute we kicked of against Athens in that hopeful summer evening at Murrayfield, Vlad has been in a tailspin from the minute his fantasies of Champions League football unravelled before his eyes. Has he now recovered, enough to re-evaluate his expectations and start to work towards them? Perhaps? This is January though and the transfer window is open and almost anything can happen so hold on to your hats another tornado could be forming just below the waves.