...Happy birthday to you,

Happy birthday Tynecastle 2010, erm...2011, erm...?

That's right folks. The planning application submitted by Hearts for the great, big, shiny new stand we were promised, turns two years old on Monday (18/01/2010).

And, my question, is this. What is happening with the damn thing?

We support a football club that seems to pride itself on the many and varied ways that us supporters can keep up to date with what is happening inside Tynecastle. We are able to...

• Visit the club's official website...where we can view at least on Hearts News Today item on weekdays.
• Subscribe to hearts.tv to get up to the minute interviews and exclusives.
• Subscribe to Hearts Mobile so we can get the news on WAP enabled phones.
• Get text alerts containing exclusive content.
• Follow Hearts on FaceBook and/or Twitter.
• We can now even pull all of our "social" websites together with the new Meebo bar on the official site.

We constantly hear about Breakfast Clubs, Adult Education Programs, Christmas Pantomimes for Kids, Magnificent 7 schemes, CashBack for Sports Clubs, even Hearts sponsored music programs. Whilst they are all GREAT, I LOVE the fact that MY club is all about the community that it sits in and not just all about itself, they just aren't what 99% of being a Hearts fan is all about. It's about FOOTBALL! After all, if it wasn't for the football...none of these Hearts sponsored projects would exist in the first place.

But when it comes to REALLY important stuff. The club seems to let us down at every turn. All it would take is a little press release from time to time to say how things are progressing....or not, as the case may be.

For example. Have a look at the official Tynecastle 2010 mini site http://www.heartsfc.premiumtv.co.uk/page/Tynecastle2010/0,,10289,00.html. Full of pomp and ceremony and blustering statements of what this will all mean to the club and the wider community. Then have a look at the "Timeline" section. According to that we were, estimated, to have demolished the main stand and the building behind it LAST SUMMER!

They also have a word "From the Captain". Erm...that'll be the guy who left the club just after the planning applications FIRST birthday then, will it? We've had TWO captains since. For a club that prides itself on that instant communaction I mentioned, it's a pretty bad show that the 2010 mini site has not been updated since the day it was first published.

Have a look through the Edinburgh council info on the project http://citydev-portal.edinburgh.gov.uk/portal/submissions.do?action=ViewPublicCaseDetails&applicationRef=08/00161/FUL. That is a list of documents that have been scanned onto their system, which the public is free to have access to. As you will see, nothing OFFICIAL has happened on it since March 13 2009!

So, what is happenning? Just tell us...we're big boys and girls. We'll understand! If you ain't got the cash. Fine! Most people that sit in the main stand don't want it demolished anyway, they'll probably all thank you if you scrap the whole thing. I, for one, am not stupid enough to think that the club will have a queue of prospective "partners" just desperate to part with £51million to see some glass, concrete and plastic thrown up in Gorgie.

Just TELL us! Something. Anything!

And, whilst I am having a wee rant about the lack of important communication from the club, can anybody tell me why, during any and all transfer windows, the club hides behind a wall of silence? Again, all it would take is for somebody, ANYBODY, from the club to come out and say...

• We will take a serious look at Csaba Laszlo's wish list and do what we can to bolster the squad.
• Really sorry folks but, due to the current world economic climate, we simply can't afford to bring any players to the club.

See that last one? I would actually accept that. Let's be honest, I would HAVE to accept it. It's not as if I am in a position to dip my hand in my pocket and pay to bring a new player in, after all. The problem is that the people who run the club DON'T say that. They don't say, well, ANYTHING really.

Okay, we have re-signed five youngsters in the last couple of days and I am happy with that. But that's just youth players being signed up on longer deals. That's simply saying "These guys have a chance to make it in the SPL.". We hear that we have been given permission to talk to Darren Barr...but that info didn't come from the club...it came from Falkirk. We know that we did bring two strikers in on trial...and at the very time they were here we heard rumours from the press that Vladimir Romanov would not be sanctioning their proposed loan moves...and as it turned out, the press were spot on. The press also tell us that we are looking to talk to Lee Miller, Kevin Kyle and Jim O'Brien. Takes a lot of working out right enough, doesn't it? Miller...out of contract in the summer. O'Brien...out of contract in the summer. Kyle...working his ticket out of Kilmarnock any way he can...and possibly also out of contract in the summer.

We Hearts supporters have very quickly gone from sitting on the edge of our seats to see just how many new faces will be announced in the madness leading up to the transfer deadline...to not really believing that we will get ANY new faces in during a transfer window.

And all it would take to sort it is a little bit of up-front honesty from the club! I, personally, couldn't really CARE that the club has a FaceBook or a Twitter page. I don't CARE that it has a shiny, new Meebo bar on the official website. All I want the club to tell us is important things. The things that matter to football fans!