Tynecastle update: 'Events, dear boy, events...'

Harold Macmillan's words, of course, have often been employed as a stark rejoinder to politicians and statesmen of the world's infinite capacity to spring a surprise when least expected - and lay waste to even the best-laid plans. But given the events of recent days, perhaps they should also now be applied to budding new bloggers seeking to explain the behaviour of their football club's mercurial owner: especially when that owner is Vladimir Romanov. Because to be sure, where Mr Romanov is concerned, there is, as the old saying goes, never a dull moment.

To recap the goings-on of the past week: on Saturday evening, immediately following an abysmal Hearts display against Kilmarnock, and a thoroughly deserved 2-0 home defeat, rumours began circulating as to the future of head coach, Valdas Ivanauskas: and this, of course, within hours of my posting on here that barring a total collapse in the team's fortunes, and given Romanov's desire for stability after all that went on last season, Ivanauskas' job was safe. The comments of David Southern, the club's press spokesman, that Ivanauskas didn't want to talk to the media after the game because he had "bigger things to worry about" were widely assumed to mean only one thing: Ivanuaskas, like Robertson, Burley and Rix before him, was history.

In fact, when Ivanuaskas flew to Lithuania to meet Romanov on Monday, what transpired was something rather different: the manager was in poor health and desperately needed a break, which his boss, who has worked with him for a number of years and continues to have full confidence in his abilities, happily granted. The ailing Ivanauskas was placed on a fortnight's sick leave; and the highly experienced Eduard Malofeev, the club's Sporting Director, placed in temporary charge of the team. But the revelations didn't stop there: indeed, what has followed may well explain just why Ivanauskas was suffering so much in the first place.

Ever since George Burley departed the scene just over a year ago, it has long been assumed both in the media and among many fans that Romanov interferes in the selection of the team: many Jambos resigning themselves, however reluctantly, to the view that it was the price to be paid for his investment in and subsequent success with the club. Indeed, this writer acknowledged it surely to be the case in my last post. On Monday, further evidence emerged in this direction when Jim Duffy (a man who talks so much sense that it makes his dreadful record in management all the more baffling), who briefly served as Hearts' Director of Football last season, told the BBC that during his time at the club, he and Graham Rix would fax their preferred team to Romanov, who would run the rule over it and often send it back with certain names deleted, and others put in their place.

Duffy, of course, could be accused of having an axe to grind with the club given the court case Rix is currently pursuing; but there is no reason not to believe what he said. Indeed, in a meeting with fans the following evening, Charlie Mann, Romanov's personal spokesman, acknowledged as much himself, and made clear that he had tried to let his boss know that such an approach plainly wasn't a good idea. And when asked to deny it when personally addressing a number of supporters' groups yesterday, Romanov himself totally failed to do so: indeed, it quickly became clear that his interference was actually part of a (however ill-conceived) strategy. Namely, that the club had put its faith in a number of talented young players, many of whom have been placed on five-year contracts: the idea being that, as explained in Part 1 of my series on Romanov, only by investing and believing in youth, allowing these players to grow and develop together, and not spending beyond its means, could the club hope to achieve its goals of ending the domination of the Old Firm.

But the problem is this has plainly resulted in certain players being continually favoured, with the selection of other more senior pros (notably the highly popular Julien Brellier) vetoed by Romanov. Not only does this chronically undermine the authority of the manager, but it also totally de-stabilises team morale: for why would someone give their all in training when they know that, however well they might be playing, they cannot expect a consistent run in the team? And conversely, why would someone else give their all when they know they are bound to be selected, no matter what?

Hardly surprisingly, this has resulted in factions emerging in the dressing room: with senior players in one corner, and those brought in personally by Romanov in another. All this was effectively confirmed by captain Steven Pressley earlier today, when he, flanked by Paul Hartley and Craig Gordon, laid bare to the assembled media his deep unhappiness with the constant instability at the club, and especially, with the chronic interference of its owner. Pressley, one of the club's greatest ever skippers, has served Hearts magnificently for over eight years, and conducted himself with astonishing grace and dignity during the many traumas of last season: for him to have been driven to such a move means that something must be very seriously wrong.

It is surely not difficult now to understand why Ivanauskas' health has broken down; nor why the team has played so disappointingly so often this season. Unfortunately, the one man who appears unable to comprehend this is Romanov himself: for the event which triggered Pressley, Hartley and Gordon's decision to go to the press was the owner's astonishing attack on his players at the training ground this morning, at which they were told in no uncertain terms that unless they beat Dunfermline tomorrow, the entire team will be sold, and a bunch of reserves picked to face Celtic next weekend. Malofeev then immediately cancelled the club's scheduled press conference; but understandably, this was just too much to take for three players who have given their all, and are sick to death of constantly being undermined by the actions of their boss.

So, not for the first time under Romanov's command, the club finds itself at a crossroads. The supporters are likely to be hugely divided tomorrow: some backing Romanov, others fully behind the players. If, as is rumoured, none of the three individuals concerned are picked, that will only make matters worse, and further infuriate the fans - and if they turn against the owner, how will he respond?

One of the strangest things about all this is I am, still, genuinely convinced of Romanov's long-term commitment, almost in spite of himself, to achieving success with Hearts: indeed, I continue to stand by what I wrote both about his motivations, and the background to events over the past year (albeit with the rider that, however much Burley and Anderton were spending beyond the club's means, and however awful a manager Rix was, all three found what many others have too: that their boss was, to put it mildly, an incredibly difficult man to work with). But as a man with a background in the former Soviet Union, and as a ruthlessly successful entrepreneur, Romanov is plainly not used to being challenged in any way; and to be frank, his reaction to it is frequently petulant, childish and deeply alarming. It might even be that his lambasting of the players this morning was prompted by being seriously questioned by fans last night: which if so, would be both pathetic, and an appalling indictment of his character.

For Romanov appears to want it all ways: not merely to own a club and help bankroll its future, but to have a very large say in which players it signs, and who is picked too. Surely, as a successful businessman, he must realise that his behaviour puts at very real risk the future success of his investment? And while the vast majority of Hearts fans have tolerated his many eccentricities and pecadilloes given all he has thus far done for and achieved with the club, there will surely come a point when his tendency to behave with such extraordinary impetuousness and lack of forethought may ellicit a rather different response: for in his actions, he all too often totally undermines the club that we all love so dearly.

This is now Romanov's greatest test. To continue blindly asserting his authority, and fail to listen to what Pressley, Gordon and Hartley have said would not just represent footballing folly, but financial folly too: it would not merely undermine the team's prospects, but were Gordon, for example, to be forced out of the club, it could hardly expect to receive the kind of transfer fee which would befit one of the most talented young goalkeepers in Europe. The owner's obstinacy would, in other words, begin to threaten his entire long-term plan. He may well have succeeded in business without listening to others up to now; but this is a very different situation, and calls for him to display long-overdue signs of dignity and humility.

Only Romanov has the power both to stop events continuing to spiral out of control, and the fans from beginning to turn against him: he needs, at long last, to cease his interference, and allow the team to get on with things in peace, under an entirely autonomous manager. It is an almighty tribute to the players that, in spite of everything, they have achieved what they have over the past fifteen months or so: the greatest frustration of all being that if only Romanov would learn from his mistakes, they might well be able to accomplish so much more.