Hearts 0, Rangers 4

By: Graham | February 28th, 2008

This was a performance as poor as Tynecastle has seen from a Hearts team. Ever. Rangers played well enough to win but, in truth, they could have put their under 19s on and probably have still beaten this Hearts side.

The only explanation for the whole side playing so poorly simultaneously was that they had hatched a plan in the dressing room prior to kick-off. Perhaps this was their protest against the sale of the team’s leading striker just when he was most needed. If we have become more and more accustomed to Romanov’s decisions and, consequently, less and less surprised by their apparent lunacy, this still took football club ownership to a whole new level of mystery.

One of the strangest sights on Wednesday was Velicka sitting in the stand and coming out to wave to the fans at half-time. I’m sure the player was responding genuinely to the warm reaction he is used to from the fans but there was a temptation to view this more cynically: here was Romanov showing his total control over the club and reaffirming that he won’t be bullied, cajoled, or persuaded into actions other might find more in keeping with an affection for Hearts. On Wednesday night, Andrius Velicka was the perfect stand-in for Vladimir Romanov’s extended middle finger.

True, Velicka was not a Hearts player. True, £1m is a lot of money. But surely Velicka ensuring Hearts ending up in the top 6 merits postponing his sale until the end of the season and £1m may be a lot of dosh for you and me but Romanov owns a bank, for goodness sake! Where will the £1m end up? Not, I suggest, in the funds made available to Hearts for new players. If the money makes it to Edinburgh, it’s more likely to be absorbed into the building costs for the Tynecastle redevelopment. Will there be a team left to support? Will there be supporters left to fill the new stand?

And Hearts, being Hearts, will travel north to Inverness in good spirit and expect to win.