Hearts chief Andrew McKinlay has called out the Hearts boo boys who targeted chairwoman Ann Budge and other senior figures – telling them they overstepped the mark.
Jambos supporters protested against the board after damaging results at Tynecastle in December left them out of Europe and bottom of the league. A draw with Moldovan minnows Petrocub saw Neil Critchley‘s side blow a golden opportunity for knockout stage Euro football and was followed up a week later by a derby defeat to Hibs.
Those results saw Budge, CEO McKinlay, new sporting director Graeme Jones come under severe fire with irate fans filmed aiming their abuse at the chairwoman. Hearts have since picked up and are on a four-game unbeaten run and McKinlay said: “We are very fortunate that we live in a country where you can protest and you’re allowed to protest, so I will always uphold people’s rights to protest. I have no issue with people singing sack the board either if that’s what they feel.
“That’s a common thing for football fans to sing when they’re not happy with things at a club. What I don’t think is appropriate or should be tolerated is singing about individuals in an abusive manner or being abusive to any individuals to their face or otherwise.
“I just don’t think that that is appropriate. It wouldn’t be accepted in any other area of life and it shouldn’t be accepted within football. I totally get the frustrations of the fans. We were all frustrated.
“We’re all Hearts fans. We’re all in this together and we all need to try and come together. But as I said at the beginning, it’s people’s right to protest and if they wish to do so then I’m certainly not going to criticise them or tell them that they shouldn’t do it.
“We’ve had some games that I think we’ll all look at that have been really disappointed. Obviously the derby, Kilmarnock away.
“I think we’re still all pretty down about the Petrocub game. Copenhagen, I can probably understand Copenhagen. I thought Bruges was disappointing as well, to be honest. I know we missed the penalty, but even without that, I thought it wasn’t our best performance. I thought we were a better team than them. Copenhagen were a decent team, so I think we took our hats off to them.”
Hearts 2-2 draw with Petrocub – the worst side in the 36-team Conference League – meant they missed out on a first knockout stage appearance in almost 40 years on goal difference. McKinlay said: “Petrocub, I still can’t believe that really what happened that night. I thought we were miles better than them. They then scored and we just looked shell-shocked. We managed to get ourselves to 2-1, so you thought, that’s fine. Then they got the penalty.
“A disaster, I’ll be honest with you that night. That is the overwhelming feeling, but what I would say is we thought going into it that six points might get us through and seven points would definitely get us through. I think to have had more European football beyond Christmas would have been wonderful. Having said that, let’s take a view that we can now focus on the league and the Cup, and we’ll aim to do as well as we can in both of them.”
Boss Critchley last week slammed leaked info regarding Cammy Devlin‘s contract, which claimed the Aussie could leave for £280,000. And McKinlay, who has backed up his head coach in saying the info was wrong, went even further, claiming it was UNLAWFUL.
He added: “It’s hugely disappointing. Don’t get me wrong, football is the leakiest thing you can work in. I find it incredible some of the information that gets out there.
“I think it’s because people have information and it gives them a certain cache that they can then tell someone ‘look at this I’ve got’ and it’s very difficult to work out where that comes from. Especially when some of that is not necessarily from within the club – there’s a lot of people involved in these sorts of deals.
“From a journalist’s perspective, I totally understand that they have a job to do. They are trying to get information on who we are bringing in and who we aren’t bringing in.
“What happened last week stepped over a line. It stepped into an area of commercially confidential information. It’s actually unlawful to disclose that sort of information and my view is that should never have been made public.
“The information was wrong but that’s not really the point. To release something like that could cause huge detriment to the club.
“Some of the other information that’s been released over the last few months like team lines, would appear to have come from within the club, and then through fans who are disclosing it further. I find that surprising, that if you’re a Hearts fan or a Hearts person, why you would want to disclose things like that.”