Burley gets dagger in heart from Romanov

Hearts majority shareholder Vladimir Romanov has launched a blistering attack on former manager George Burley, sacked chief executive Phil Anderton and former chairman George Foulkes.

Burley left Tynecastle in October after taking the club to the top of the Bank of Scotland Premier League.

The former Scotland international was followed out of the door by Anderton, who was axed by the Lithuanian, before Foulkes resigned in protest.

But the Jambos’ chief insists the club would have been “buried” if they had continued at the club.

Speaking on the BBC’s Frontline Scotland programme, to be screened tonight, Romanov said: “I gave these people full control to direct the club and, in one year, there was no result, not even a thought as to where we were going.

“Maybe I could have coped with the management to the end of the season…but they didn’t have the elementary human qualities. Each day they turned up at the club it was doing harm.

“I’ve already said I did not set any high demands. I simply waited for the answer to the question: ’What can people do’? And they did not answer.

“If that had been answered with one step forward I’d have believed it but they could not even say that. I fear that if we had continued with these people then all my ideas would have been buried.

“We would have got to the very quick burial and death of the club as every day these people were present they were damaging Hearts.”

But Foulkes dismissed Romanov’s claims, highlighting the success enjoyed by the three men at the start of the season.

He told the Glasgow Herald: “George Burley was manager of the month for two months in succession. He had led us to our longest winning start to a season in living memory.

“Phil Anderton was a remarkably successful chief executive. Season tickets went up from just over 7,000 to well over 13,000.

“As far as I was concerned, I was doing the job as chairman for absolutely nothing. I was getting paid nothing for it, I was enjoying it and people said I was doing a reasonably successful job.”