There is a certain audacity in the way Hearts have gone about their business. While the rest of us were still digesting the departure of the previous...
There is a certain audacity in the way Hearts have gone about their business. While the rest of us were still digesting the departure of the previous regime, the Tynecastle hierarchy moved with quiet, deliberate speed to pluck Wouter Vrancken from the Belgian Pro League. This is not a manager who has been parked on the global scrapheap. This is a man who walked out of Genk, one of Europe's most sophisticated factories for coaching talent, citing a need for a new challenge. And if you know anything about the man, you know he does not do things by halves.Vrancken is a product of the same school of thought that produced the likes of Michel Preud'homme. He demands a high press that borders on obsessive. He expects his centre backs to be as comfortable on the ball as the playmaker. At KV Mechelen, he took a side that had no business finishing in the top half of the table and turned them into a band of snarling, aggressive possession monsters. He does not park the bus. He never has. For a Hearts fanbase that has grown weary of watching sideways passes in the middle third, this is a gust of fresh air from the Low Countries. But there is a catch. A big one.The elephant in the room is his exit from Genk. It was messy. Rumours persist of a fractured dressing room, of a manager who pushed his players so hard that the elastic snapped. You do not walk away from a club of Genk's stature three games into a season unless something went very wrong. Was it a clash of egos A failure in man management Or was it simply a manager who refused to compromise his principles, even when the results turned sour The truth probably lies somewhere in the middle. The Scottish Premiership is a league that chews up high. minded philosophies and spits them out. You can have all the tactical flexibility in the world, but if you cannot handle a wet Wednesday night in Dingwall, you will be found out.What Hearts are getting, however, is a coach who understands transitional play better than almost anyone currently working in the SPFL. His teams are built to suffocate the opponent in their own half and then break with clinical finishing. He is a pragmatist inside a romantic's body. He will have watched Hearts' scattergun approach to recruitment over the last two years and he will have a plan. The question is whether the board will give him the time to execute it. The fans in Gorgie are a patient lot, but patience runs thin when the low block is not working. Vrancken has the CV. He has the tactical nous. Now he has to prove he can handle the emotional weight of a club that lives and dies by the 90 minute battle. This is not Belgium. This is Hearts. And the real test starts now.
