It has been a long, tedious week for Hearts supporters, after the defeat to The Evil Empire last Sunday.
Things were not exactly exploding all over the place like they had the week or so earlier, but they were trundling along in their now usual Tynecastle in Crisis strife and misdemeanor. This was mostly centred around the actual start date of new interim head coach - Riabovas.
It seemed that everyday this week in the press, he had a different start date, from the 1st of December for a 6 month trial to Tomorrow to never. Meanwhile Malofeev was offski to get his UEFA coaching certificates which he didn't need ( not for a while anyroads ).
Malofeev in charge has been a disaster really, regardless of his coaching/managerial capabilities - the fact that he can't speak a word of English has made his position nonsensical and just added to the Hearts headlining the panto season subplot of the last few weeks. Trackside advice, tactical changes and rants need to be translated to McGlynn and this week Stevie Frail before being shouted out across the pitch, woefully too late ( obviously ). A few pundits on the radio i think Billy Dodds in particular have actually come across as being really pretty angry about that?
After last weeks i game i was firmly of the belief that Hearts still had a way to go before we would turn the corner and things would start to get better. So why then was i just as adamantly of the opinion by Friday that Hearts would win one nil up in Inverness. Where was the evidence for that.
I passed this divination onto one of the blokes in the work, his response being 'crap it will be 1 - 1'.
Bloody hell, i think, he is just as adamant as me in his prediction.
So i inquired as to how he got to be so confident.
Turns out he has a system. He is a bit of a gambler, not big time but he knows his way round the bookies and a fixed odds coupon. He has a system based on the product of the number of goals for and against for each game coming up, this runs to the last 5 years. There is a factor added to this based on actuals which makes things more realistic. He can then simply input a game - in this case Inverness Caley Thistle V Hearts into his system and it will pop out the most likely scoreline based on the info and the system.
This came out with 1 - 1 hence his confidence in the scoreline.
So he asked me how i got to be so confident - 'I just feel it in ma water man'
There was a bit more to it than that but not much. Based mostly on a few factors that came through and came to mind during Friday.
Last week Pressley was on the bench, we all know that reading Hearts and predicting a teamsheet is next to impossible - but i thought in the last blog entry that given he was on the bench then maybe his punishment was almost over and he would be back in. So thats a plus that would lift the team.
Likewise i suspected, no basis for this other than it is quite sensible, that Hartley, Aguair and Brellier would again make up most of the midfield. Three games together and now it should start to fall into place again, so maybe we would not be so disjointed.
Vlad was back over and making noises that he was in concilliatory mood, he wanted to calm the stormy seas - meeting with supporters groups etc. Ivanauskas was also back and apparently ready to go back to work - Riabovas now no longer necessary?? Ivanauaskas was actually over for a court appearance for speeding, but i guess decided to kill two birds with one stone and thought he might as well manage Hearts for a week or two whilst he is here. No really this i thought was a good thing at least, for more upheaval it is a return to a known quantity.
So these things brought the idea into my head that against all the odds Hearts would actually turn up in Inverness on Saturday and be confident and upbeat and ready to take on the world and on their road to recovery and 2nd place.
Premature i think, and not because, what i say here is not true it might be, we didn't get beat!
Premature because it was Inverness up at Inverness - a flying Hearts team on the top of their game would and always does struggle up there. So why would i think this would be different, pretty simple really i just put my maroon specs on again.
Did not catch too much of the game, i watched the Scotland v Australia rugby match until we were getting hosed and gave up the ghost on them. Tuned into the coverage from http://www.bbc.co.uk/scotland/sportscotland/sportsound/
The Hearts team changed again looked much more like last years with a back 4 including Neilson, Pressley and Fyassas and Brellier, Aguair and Hartley were in the middle. So was that a good thing?
The game did not quite have 0 - 0 written all over it but it wasn't far a way from it.
Hearts could have won it, Hartley brought out a very good save low to the keepers right, near the end but ICT also had their chances and could have taken all three points. A defeat yesterday would have been a disaster for Hearts we would surely have plunged deeper into the mealstrom so getting away from Inverness with a point was not so bad really, even if it does mean we lose ground on Rangers and Aberdeen.
There is a crucial fixture list coming up over the next few weeks leading up to the visit of the stinky Hibees on Boxing day, we have
ST Mirren Away
Motherwell Home
Aberdeen Home
Dundee Utd Away
Hibs Home
Right now it sounds like nonsense but ( last year it would have tripped off my tongue ) if we can somehow pull out a run of results from these games running up to Xmas our season can be turned round and saved.
It is time now for the players to once again come to the fore, starting in Paisley next week, we need a performance and we need a win.
So
HOOO ON THE JAMBOS
I guess i need to conceed that method and algorithm have won out over intuition this time round.
Showing posts with label Elvis. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Elvis. Show all posts
Sunday, November 26, 2006
Tuesday, November 14, 2006
Rubberneckin
Today is the day after the latest episode in the continuing unravelling of Heart of Midlothian Football club.
At the end of last season i remember reading a pile of comments on various sites from, mostly jealous Hibee fans, they would say something like - Just wait til next season where it will all unravel and you will be left homeless and devoid of any hope, after that mental Vlad has torn the Hearts out of your team then F&*ked Off, Ha ha ha ha BELIEVE.
Never knew where those eejits were coming from or why other than just the jealousy factor of Hearts doing not bad considering.
Well now i am not so sure, maybe they had a point.
It goes a bit like this, and you understand this is purely my take on the situation from my limited vantage point.
That statement two weeks ago from Pressley, i said at the time - it read like an abdication of his Captaincy. And so it turns out.
Another head coach ( interim ( aren't they all )) is appointed and Pressley blows again, i think he may well have just gone off on one, a step too far ( who could blame him really but the statement he made was the killer for me, his days were always numbered after that ). Apparently the management team at Tynecastle attempted to orchestrate a vote of no confidence in their captain by the players. This sounds all too much like a coup it is like some great communist plot to overthrow the aristocracy. You just couldn't write it.
Elvis gets wind of this and walks stating that he is not mentally able to play tonight.
Hartley was asked to captain the team and when he refused was dropped, then Neilson was asked to captain the team and when he refused he was dropped too. Then Gordon was asked if he would captain the team, when he refused he was dr.. no he wasn't Stevie Banks was injured so we only had 3rd choice keeper so Gordon wasn't dropped.
Finally Berra accepted the captaincy for the night.
It is all just too sad for words really, to watch this great institution parade its dirty washing so puclicly it hurts us deeply. Like an episode of Jerry f'n Springer we look like a bunch of inbreds screaming and bawling like a bunch of uneducated morons.
I fear for Pressley at Hearts, i fear his time may be up but all that really bothers me about that is that his end is not as it should be, he should waltz into retirement or player coaching role after a glorious Hearts career with his head well and truly held high, marked down as one of the truly great captains of this team. No matter how much bloody money or power Romanov thinks he has got he has absolutely no right whatsoever to deny Elvis this privilege. That said the statement made by the big man was just enough rope that he handed straight to himself.
New coach from, you guessed it Kaunas, their season is over, they have another league title and don't need a coach for a couple of months so we get him. Romanov must have worked it out that league titles in Lithuania are not the same thing as league titles in Scotland. No disrespect and come on lets not play down our downtrodden game again, it is a sight more difficult to negotiate a challenge over here than it is over there. This merry-go-round or Lithuanian's is not going to do the job. You could take them all back bar Chesny and Velicka and have almost any bog standard Scottish manager and the team would improve overnight.
After the initial 20 minutes of the Falkirk v Hearts game which i watched in the Railway in Juniper Green, Falkirk started to play footbal around us. The thought crossed my mind that i didn't really expect to see any football from Hearts, instead it was like rubbernecking a crash on the opposite side of the bypass, it all seemed to go in slow motion you knew you shouldn't but you just couldn't help watching with morbid fascination. By this morning i decided that in Hearts we are actually witnessing a gargantuan train wreck, it hasn't even happened yet but the rails are beginning to buckle under our wheels and the carraiges are beginning to rear up in the air.
Said it before but it just makes no sense, If for whatever politics you feel the need to drop 2 of your back 4 then for all footballing gods you must retain the other two. So Tall and Goncalves were nowhere to be seen either, the back 4 then was,
Wallace, Berra, Zaliukas, Karipidis
The midfield without Hartley, had at least a couple of midfielders Brellier and Aguair, Brellier ( never thought he would ever play for Hearts again ) looked pretty much off the pace from start to finish.
Hearts actually started the game OK, if totally disjointed allows that. We had a couple of decent efforts in the first 20 minutes and could easily have been 2 up. Falkirk owned the last half of the first period tho. Did not really do much. That Stokes bloke looked for too much like he was thinking 'I am really only here on loan you know, actually i play for The Arsenal' some decent touches but mostly he just got frustrated and lashed out a bit.
Half time came and it is 0 - 0
Hearts what the hell can you say about us, the one thing we most definitely are not is a football team, just a bunch of players who happen to get paid by the same club. This shows so much in our game. No one knows where anyone else is, or has any idea what is expected of them, we play the game far to far away from each other and no one is making any runs and oh it is just crap.
This disjointed aberration continued in the second half but at least we were fighting, we were winning every 50 50, got to put this down to the much maligned Baresa and Brellier and the back 4 and Miko ( had not a bad game considering ). One split second of space for Aguair to find Velicka, he collected still outside the box and took it early, keeper should have got it but hey, you gotta take that.
From the minute we scored we dropped ten yards and handed the game to Falkirk, aaarrggh
Mole did have a chance as he was clean through just to hit straight at the keeper, pretty shoddy and he should be left out of things for a while. Reminds me of the mental decision to loan out Callum Elliott ???
It was innevitable really that Falkirk would equalise, a well worked carving of the Hearts defence allowed Latapy to stroke the ball low into the corner.
1 - 1 a fair reflection on the proceedings.
Falkirk could have won it right at the death, but fortunately for us we managed to scramble away.
Must take umbridge at the Setanta commentary, it was so clear that Hearts could do no right and Falkirk could do no wrong. There was good and bad on both sides but no real balance there. The best example being a wee knock in the back of Latapy ( a foul for sure ) but the wee man flings himself down for a blatant dive not a word from the commentary. If that had been one of the Lithuanians they would have been all over it as more evidence of the cancer Heart of Midlothian Football Club have allowed into our beautiful game.. give it up for gods sake.
Everyone knows that the media attack a wounded animal like a bunch of hyenas but it really is going too far, it really is not helping the situation.
Lastly, i took note of the body language etc of Hartley / Neilson on the bench, they did not look in the least bit perturbed to me. No idea what to make of that but i expected soor pusses.
Lastly ( again ) Malofeev, attacks the 4th official and gets sent off and apparently takes it out on the changing room furniture - working for Vlad sure is a stressful gig.
At the end of last season i remember reading a pile of comments on various sites from, mostly jealous Hibee fans, they would say something like - Just wait til next season where it will all unravel and you will be left homeless and devoid of any hope, after that mental Vlad has torn the Hearts out of your team then F&*ked Off, Ha ha ha ha BELIEVE.
Never knew where those eejits were coming from or why other than just the jealousy factor of Hearts doing not bad considering.
Well now i am not so sure, maybe they had a point.
It goes a bit like this, and you understand this is purely my take on the situation from my limited vantage point.
That statement two weeks ago from Pressley, i said at the time - it read like an abdication of his Captaincy. And so it turns out.
Another head coach ( interim ( aren't they all )) is appointed and Pressley blows again, i think he may well have just gone off on one, a step too far ( who could blame him really but the statement he made was the killer for me, his days were always numbered after that ). Apparently the management team at Tynecastle attempted to orchestrate a vote of no confidence in their captain by the players. This sounds all too much like a coup it is like some great communist plot to overthrow the aristocracy. You just couldn't write it.
Elvis gets wind of this and walks stating that he is not mentally able to play tonight.
Hartley was asked to captain the team and when he refused was dropped, then Neilson was asked to captain the team and when he refused he was dropped too. Then Gordon was asked if he would captain the team, when he refused he was dr.. no he wasn't Stevie Banks was injured so we only had 3rd choice keeper so Gordon wasn't dropped.
Finally Berra accepted the captaincy for the night.
It is all just too sad for words really, to watch this great institution parade its dirty washing so puclicly it hurts us deeply. Like an episode of Jerry f'n Springer we look like a bunch of inbreds screaming and bawling like a bunch of uneducated morons.
I fear for Pressley at Hearts, i fear his time may be up but all that really bothers me about that is that his end is not as it should be, he should waltz into retirement or player coaching role after a glorious Hearts career with his head well and truly held high, marked down as one of the truly great captains of this team. No matter how much bloody money or power Romanov thinks he has got he has absolutely no right whatsoever to deny Elvis this privilege. That said the statement made by the big man was just enough rope that he handed straight to himself.
New coach from, you guessed it Kaunas, their season is over, they have another league title and don't need a coach for a couple of months so we get him. Romanov must have worked it out that league titles in Lithuania are not the same thing as league titles in Scotland. No disrespect and come on lets not play down our downtrodden game again, it is a sight more difficult to negotiate a challenge over here than it is over there. This merry-go-round or Lithuanian's is not going to do the job. You could take them all back bar Chesny and Velicka and have almost any bog standard Scottish manager and the team would improve overnight.
After the initial 20 minutes of the Falkirk v Hearts game which i watched in the Railway in Juniper Green, Falkirk started to play footbal around us. The thought crossed my mind that i didn't really expect to see any football from Hearts, instead it was like rubbernecking a crash on the opposite side of the bypass, it all seemed to go in slow motion you knew you shouldn't but you just couldn't help watching with morbid fascination. By this morning i decided that in Hearts we are actually witnessing a gargantuan train wreck, it hasn't even happened yet but the rails are beginning to buckle under our wheels and the carraiges are beginning to rear up in the air.
Said it before but it just makes no sense, If for whatever politics you feel the need to drop 2 of your back 4 then for all footballing gods you must retain the other two. So Tall and Goncalves were nowhere to be seen either, the back 4 then was,
Wallace, Berra, Zaliukas, Karipidis
The midfield without Hartley, had at least a couple of midfielders Brellier and Aguair, Brellier ( never thought he would ever play for Hearts again ) looked pretty much off the pace from start to finish.
Hearts actually started the game OK, if totally disjointed allows that. We had a couple of decent efforts in the first 20 minutes and could easily have been 2 up. Falkirk owned the last half of the first period tho. Did not really do much. That Stokes bloke looked for too much like he was thinking 'I am really only here on loan you know, actually i play for The Arsenal' some decent touches but mostly he just got frustrated and lashed out a bit.
Half time came and it is 0 - 0
Hearts what the hell can you say about us, the one thing we most definitely are not is a football team, just a bunch of players who happen to get paid by the same club. This shows so much in our game. No one knows where anyone else is, or has any idea what is expected of them, we play the game far to far away from each other and no one is making any runs and oh it is just crap.
This disjointed aberration continued in the second half but at least we were fighting, we were winning every 50 50, got to put this down to the much maligned Baresa and Brellier and the back 4 and Miko ( had not a bad game considering ). One split second of space for Aguair to find Velicka, he collected still outside the box and took it early, keeper should have got it but hey, you gotta take that.
From the minute we scored we dropped ten yards and handed the game to Falkirk, aaarrggh
Mole did have a chance as he was clean through just to hit straight at the keeper, pretty shoddy and he should be left out of things for a while. Reminds me of the mental decision to loan out Callum Elliott ???
It was innevitable really that Falkirk would equalise, a well worked carving of the Hearts defence allowed Latapy to stroke the ball low into the corner.
1 - 1 a fair reflection on the proceedings.
Falkirk could have won it right at the death, but fortunately for us we managed to scramble away.
Must take umbridge at the Setanta commentary, it was so clear that Hearts could do no right and Falkirk could do no wrong. There was good and bad on both sides but no real balance there. The best example being a wee knock in the back of Latapy ( a foul for sure ) but the wee man flings himself down for a blatant dive not a word from the commentary. If that had been one of the Lithuanians they would have been all over it as more evidence of the cancer Heart of Midlothian Football Club have allowed into our beautiful game.. give it up for gods sake.
Everyone knows that the media attack a wounded animal like a bunch of hyenas but it really is going too far, it really is not helping the situation.
Lastly, i took note of the body language etc of Hartley / Neilson on the bench, they did not look in the least bit perturbed to me. No idea what to make of that but i expected soor pusses.
Lastly ( again ) Malofeev, attacks the 4th official and gets sent off and apparently takes it out on the changing room furniture - working for Vlad sure is a stressful gig.
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