CRAIG LEVEIN is fast becoming Scottish football's resident volcano. Most of the time he is an impassive and yet impressive sight to be admired as he calmly overlooks the game. Every now and again, however, he explodes with an unexpected force as if it has all been simmering underneath for too long, growing in pressure before the inevitable. The latest caustic comments, directed at Hearts' David Obua and his team-mates, have caused outrage among the vast majority of fans from his old club
The Dundee United manager chose to voice his opinions in a tabloid newspaper but the sentiments came across as admirably restrained. They flowed perfectly rather than erupted, and still caused maximum damage.
There is no argument about the fact
that some Hearts players have 'previous' in the diving and feigning injury categories: Saulius Mikoliunas was apparently disappointed not to get an Oscar nomination for his performance against Scotland in 2007.
For all the bad feeling, when Levein claims that it is not sour grapes because Hearts have recently left United in their wake in the league, I believe him. He is simply flagging up a problem that still exists in our game, even if it has not reached epidemic proportions the way it has in the Portuguese league, amongst others.
In actual fact the problem is much worse in the English Premier League than it is up here, where nearly every game has at least two or three players giving a dying-swan performance that would be considered melodramatic at the Royal Ballet. What makes it more galling is that the onset of apparently life-threatening pain after the slightest brush seems to be more prevalent with some of the 6ft 4in beasts than anyone else.
Before I get the usual reaction on the Hearts websites, it is not a problem confined to their club in Scotland. I was always quick to name and shame the likes of Merouane Zemmama on the other side of the city for his pathetic antics. He was a delightfully skilful player but to be blunt, his behaviour was frankly embarrassing some of the time. In fact I remember after one particularly sordid attempt to win a penalty even his own players roundly abused him. He seemed to calm down a bit after that. Maybe we need more of this in the game; team-mates having a word with those who are trying to cheat and con the referees, the fans, their fellow professionals and the game as an ideal.
The fact that it was a Jambos legend who laid into some of the Hearts players this week was important and refreshing. Craig Levein would probably have preferred it to be anyone other than Hearts for his latest salvo. Others will argue that he is simply a bit of a loose cannon anyway after his previous outbursts, which have become too numerous to note here. The thing is, the vast majority of his arguments are perfectly reasonable, he is certainly being sincere and honest almost to a fault and he would probably even own up to being a tad stubborn when it comes to points of principle, which again is no bad thing.
That is not to say there isn't another agenda as well. He certainly hasn't missed referees in the past and these latest comments will also hit the target with the officials. Csaba Laszlo and his boys were just caught in the crossfire; the people he really wanted to get the message were those match officials and they will have received it loud and clear.
It is an old trick, one perfected and used regularly by Sir Alex Ferguson, but I suspect he learned the habit from Jock Stein who used it even more liberally in Europe to counter the effect of weak referees in foreign climes. The referees now can't help but be on their guard and extra vigilant when Hearts play. Job done.
Maybe it is just something about the post at Tannadice that gets to you. Following on from Jim McLean, the current incumbent has become the SFA's 'go to' hate figure. The thinking is he will be in trouble with the beaks again after suggesting that Obua specifically was cheating. There was also the more subtle question posed as to whether or not the players were being coached in these dark arts. Now that is serious: if Csaba is Snape, Mikoliunas is Malfoy, then who is Vladimir?
Actually that isn't fair – the Hearts players have been schooled in much more enlightened ways this season. Granted, they haven't always been a joy to watch but they have been extremely effective and that is no mean feat considering the turmoil at the club. The loss of Christophe Berra could have led to an implosion but they are still up there and arguably getting stronger. Two weeks ago against St Mirren there were no signs of the rolling about that Levein is complaining about, so if it is a problem, it is one that can be turned on and off like a tap. Maybe Levein's reaction will have switched it off at the mains.
This just leaves the SFA and their reaction, but even here there is a problem. Some in the organisation might not always be impressed by the forthright opinions of the Dundee United manager, but on this occasion isn't he just echoing the sentiments that Gordon Smith voiced in his first days as SFA chief executive?
When Gordon proposed that video evidence should be used retrospectively to catch the cheats and ban them later if the officials had missed it on the day, I was delighted. I had been calling for precisely that system for the previous four years. UEFA and FIFA wouldn't play ball, not even on a trial basis, but it did show that at the top level within the SFA they felt that diving and feigning injury were still scourges of the game here.
How then will the SFA be able to rap Levein's knuckles and still keep a straight face when all he was trying to do is something they wanted in the first place? In a wider sense how will any young player learning the game understand how wrong it is to dive when Cristiano Ronaldo, arguably the best player in the world, is still at it and he isn't being vilified week in, week out for his behaviour?
The full article contains 1085 words and appears in Scotland On Sunday newspaper.
