I wonder if staff at Hearts are taking a bit more interest in how things are going with the financial stability of the owner's main business.

Things are never but interesting at Tynecastle since Vladimir Romanov took over the ownership of the Edinburgh club. Managers come and go; players stage press conferences to state their case against the management and rebels get binned. The latest is the delay if paying staff at the club. The entire Hearts squad found themselves without their weekly pay last Friday due to what the club described as "technical reasons". Then the non-playing staff were told their monthly salaries would not be paid on the due date. Not good news for anybody with standing orders due to be paid. Former player Darren Jackson knows what it is like to play for Hearts and insists the club's players were right to be concerned about not being paid last week. He believes players usually take no notice of off-field goings on. But it is a different matter when it starts to affect their non-football life. Footballers are often the last people anybody would sympathise with over loss of earnings, but Jackson insists it is a myth that all top-flight players are well-off. Jackson said: "You talk about takeovers and all that - that doesn't really affect players. You just play football - you don't worry who's in charge of the club. But when your wages are not coming in... Everyone just thinks that they're all earning loads of money so it doesn't matter if the wages aren't coming in. But it's not like that up in Scotland. It must be difficult for the players."

When the news of late payments reached the media, there were rumours circulating of a player revolt but this was fiercely denied by club captain Christophe Berra. Jackson believes the squad would be wise to keep their counsel after what happened to Stephen Pressley, Paul Hartley and Craig Gordon when they challenged Romanov two years ago. Jackson said: "It happened before with the three of them and they're not there now. At the end of the day, everyone will be worrying about themselves and whether they're getting paid. If it's taken care of this week, it's taken care of. Hopefully it doesn't happen again because it's a fantastic club. I had the pleasure of a year and a half there and I don't think people realise how big a club it is."
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