By Ewing Graham
Last Updated: 12:21am GMT 28/11/2006

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Two weeks to the day that Steven Pressley refused to play for Hearts against Falkirk, it was revealed during a press conference at Tynecastle yesterday that the Scotland defender is to have more say in team selection than the club's owner, Vladimir Romanov.

It completed a dramatic reversal of fortune for the 33-year-old. His omission from the 1-1 draw at Falkirk was reportedly triggered by certain foreign players attempting to initiate a vote of no confidence in him as club captain. That in turn followed the decision by Pressley to hi-jack a pre-match press conference last month to announce the players' concern at the way Hearts were being run.

Paul Hartley, who had joined in that protest, was also left out of the team to play Falkirk by caretaker manager Eduard Malofeev, who confined Pressley to the role of unused substitute in the subsequent home defeat by Rangers.

Now, though, the popular Valdas Ivanauskas, who has returned as head coach following five weeks of sick leave in Lithuania for an undisclosed health issue, has handed an olive branch to Pressley.
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"I will have discussions with a lot of the players but Steven Pressley is our captain and a very big figure in the future of Hearts," he said. "I will speak with him to decide how we will work for our next game because he is an important man in our team and he can help turn the situation around.

"It has not been an easy situation for anyone at the club or for Steven Pressley but I am looking forward to working with him again because we need our best players on the pitch.

"Vladimir is a big man at this club. I think it is normal in business for him to inquire about team selection. He asks who plays, who is injured, but he is away, he is not here, he is not on the pitch every day. I think it's not possible for him to pick the team. He had information but the last decision is the manager's.

"Working with Vladimir is interesting. He wants to make Hearts a bigger club in Europe and we need time. To make this target we need a system. You can buy the best players but what you need is a system working for two or three years."

The former Hamburg striker refused to criticise Malofeev for his treatment of Pressley, Hartley and Scotland full-back Robbie Neilson during his absence.

"Eduard was in charge and it was his decision not to pick the players," he said. "His word was the last word."

The signs are, though, that Romanov has realised, for the time being at least, the importance of keeping the fan base onside. His ambition is to establish his UKIO Bank in Scotland's financial capital and, while it may run contrary to his natural instincts, he needs to make a public show of responding positively to the growing protests from supporters if that is to be a success.

Pressley, in his ninth season at Tynecastle, is an iconic figure and his removal would have been counter-productive in PR terms and harmful to the footballing operation.

In another move to appease disgruntled season-ticket holders, Ivanauskas announced that former player Steven Frail will be offered the post of assistant head coach, replacing John McGlynn, who has left to become manager of Raith Rovers, thus maintaining a much-needed Scottish voice in the technical area.

Now that Ivanauskas is back at the helm, he must halt a sequence of eight matches without a victory which has seen the club exit the CIS Insurance Cup at the quarter-final stage and slump to fifth place in the Scottish Premier League.

"Our first target is to win and our fans are maybe angry about the results and the situation," he conceded. "The supporters would die for this club. They are the greatest supporters in the country. They are not happy at present, but we will change our results and our game."

Taken from telegraph.co.uk