DEAR Vlad, it's been a while since we last spoke face to face, but I suppose that would be a fairly uncomfortable event given how we parted at Tynecastle.
You remember, don't you? Hearts were riding high until you sacked first the manager George Burley – now the Scotland boss – on a whim. Then the highly regarded Phil Anderton. He didn't want for a job long either, by the way. In fact, he now works for
the ATP, one of the world's biggest sports bodies. I told you then such moves were folly and hoped I could reign in your more outrageous musings. Sadly, I was wrong, and had no option but to resign my post.
It hurt then, and hurts even now. You see I love Hearts, truly adore them. And it pains me to see how you are putting all connected with it through the wringer. Of course we might have had a chance to discuss issues over the odd drink in the Director's Box if I chose to attend as is my privilege as a former club chairman. But we both know that you made it clear, albeit through third parties, that I am no longer welcome.
Which is fine, because I retained my season ticket, and sit among my fellow supporters directly opposite you in the Wheatfield Stand.
However I sometimes think I should exercise that courtesy if only to meet you and Junior in a corner, bang your heads together, and ask just what you are playing at. Because that's what all the fans want to know. It is why your commercial team has been reduced to ringing round existing season ticket holders asking why they haven't renewed.
It's not rocket science, Vlad, really. It's because of your broken promises of giving them a team to be proud of, having work start on the stand, delivering winners.
Now it would be great to sit down and chat to you about all of this and I'd hope to after you said you'd be at all the final games of this season. Admittedly my eyesight isn't what it once was, but I've seen very little sign of you. Then, I'm not alone. Very few people have clapped eyes on you this season.
Of course it may be that you actually do believe you can achieve all you planned. And I think the majority of the maroon faithful would back you if that was the case. But they – and I – need to see some evidence. We need to know that you aren't just full of hot air, but have the substance to match your irreverent style.
I mean, are you not embarrassed, even a little? Your team finished below Hibs, a side that will no doubt achieve zero debt by summer. Do you find that in any way acceptable? That a far superior sporting organisation as Hearts with a more loyal fanbase and greater potential, slides below a team that hasn't won a Scottish Cup in over a century?
And let me come back to our spat over George Burley. He was a potentially great manager, the fact he now leads the hopes and aspirations of the Scottish nation vindicates my belief in that. You experimented with a couple of alternatives, which failed to work out.
Stevie Frail has tried his best, yet the poor lad doesn't even have his coaching badge yet. Now look at Rangers. They aren't a good side, they have ridden their luck all season and faced a stuttering Celtic team riddled with problems. But they have consistency and ground out results, lifting the Scottish League Cup, on the cusp of winning the SPL, in the final of the Scottish Cup.
And now just 90 minutes away from a UEFA Cup final. They have done this after giving a poor, under-performing former manager the bullet, and instead brought in an experienced man in Walter Smith who lives and breathes the SPL.
He hasn't even had a decent transfer budget to work with and yet, by being allowed to do his job, is within touching distance of an unprecedented quadruple.
Doesn't that tell you something, comrade? Doesn't it give you a hint as to what must now be done at Hearts. And what we could have had?
Get in the manager we need, let them do their job, and watch the season ticket sales go through the roof. Show leadership, show conviction. Show some guts.
Heal the club and heal your relationship with the fans, so we can raise a glass in tribute to your leadership, rather than drowning our sorrows whenever Saturday comes. But whatever you do, do it now, I implore you. Otherwise it may be too little, too late.
Yours in sport,
GEORGE
Basso exit is a No.1 mistakeI COULDN'T help but shake my head on hearing that orders had come from on high to axe Anthony Basso from goal.
His crime? Refusing to sign a new contract after he was advised it wasn't good enough.
Stevie Frail admitted the keeper wasn't playing as a direct consequence.
And if that isn't Vlad interfering in team affairs, then please explain to me what is.
I accept those running the club have reservations about agents and, in some cases, perhaps deservedly so.
But they shouldn't all be treated like pariahs, should they?
Take Dave McPherson and Gary Mackay for instance, the latter helping advance the career of goal-a-game Gary Glen.
Friends of the club.
Players, especially young players, have a right to be protected by their agents.
But why will new blood want to come to the club if they feel a gun will be put to their head anytime they ask for better?
Something, perhaps, for the Romanovs to ponder as the close season approaches and they wonder where all the goalkeepers have gone.
