CSABA Laszlo, the manager of Heart of Midlothian, has revealed how a renewed sense of togetherness at Tynecastle turned out to be an important aspect in the rehabilitation of Calum Elliot as jeers turned to cheers for the young centre– forward.
The former Scottish Under-21 internationalist underwent a testing time at the club with a spell on loan at Motherwell before finding himself a target for Inverness last summer. Hearts rejected those enquiries and sent Elliot to Livingston, where he s
cored 11 goals in 14 games.
When he returned to training at Riccarton, however, Laszlo fretted over the player's morale. "Always I saw Calum, after he came back from Livingston, he was down and not happy," said the manager. "He'd scored a lot of goals for Livingston. In the training, to me it didn't feel as if he'd come home. There were times when I thought about playing him and I waited and waited for the right time.
"He'd trained well before the Rangers match and came on to change tactics. Then I saw the senior players, Mike Stewart and Robbie Neilson, talking to Elliot in training. Now he finds he has friends in the team. I thought I could use him away from home. Then, at Tynecastle, (if he plays], there are two possibilities, you lose or win."
The gamble paid off as Elliot scored twice against Kilmarnock and delivered a man-of-the-match display which recaptured the affection of the supporters. "Okay, the team helped him and he scored goals," Laszlo recalled. "I told Christian Nade to warm up because it was time to bring Elliot together with the fans. At the end, the people applaud the team not Elliot. Take him off before the end and see the reaction. There were 10,000 who stood and applauded."
John Robertson, speaking on the Hearts website, made the telling point this week that his old club have become resolute again. Laszlo is the architect behind this spirited revival and more players than Elliot have responded to his leadership.
Having engineered an astonishing improvement in both results and morale compared to the disappointments of the last campaign with largely the same squad of players, the manager insists he'll be happy to raise the bar even higher next time round if he can recruit the targets he wants during the summer break.
Very much focused on the challenge of finishing third behind the Old Firm as well as earning a spot in the Europa League, Laszlo, a credible contender for manager of the year in Scotland, concedes his plans for the future will be influenced by where Hearts finish in the SPL and any new faces he's able to recruit for the 2009-10 campaign.
"There's the possibility to have a very interesting competition in Scottish football," he reasoned. "If you talk about Celtic and Rangers, I don't know what they plan but I know what I plan and if our plan works and we have a little bit of luck to bring the players which can help us – and you need the luck for the right player – then I think we can do better.
"The league is not finished, and I don't know whether we will be third or fourth. But the target is to always be better than last year and definitely I think for this club it is very important to always be in the best six. It's also important for this club to be very close to winning a title. It is indifferent whether it is the League Cup, the Scottish Cup, qualifying for Europe or even winning the league title. Why not?"
As Laszlo rightly cautioned, there are many variables, both economic and football related, which make it even more difficult than usual for managers to peer into their crystal balls. "You know, in football it's not easy to talk about what happens next year," he smiled. "Maybe next year there will be another manager here, who, like me, also talks a lot …"
At a typically wide-ranging press briefing in which car metaphors abounded and the role of the manager in the engine of a football club was detailed as the electronics, Laszlo also enthused about Hearts "coming back to life".
He spoke of the necessity as a coach to be selfish. "You must be focused on you, but you can't forget about the competition. The question I've been asked the most was what I said to the players in the dressing-room at Ibrox (Hearts trailed 2-0 at the interval before earning a 2-2 draw]. It was nothing, only that I used Rangers' weakest point."
Needless to say, Laszlo wasn't going to discuss any of Celtic's weak points in advance of tomorrow's match of the day in the SPL and stressed the class and quality of their international players. "But if you close down the space, the opponent can't give you too much trouble."
The immediate challenge for Laszlo on Saturday is to measure the strength of his own side against the SPL leaders and Scottish football's dominant force in recent years.
