Hearts' Stuart Findlay admits regret with a brutally honest assessment as he looks to atone at Tynecastle

Familiarity seems to suit Stuart Findlay as he settles into life at Hearts with a manager he knows well. Derek McInnes did not hesitate to bring his former Kilmarnock loanee to Edinburgh after taking charge at Tynecastle Park. Both know they work well together, trust each other, and believe in each other. Hearts stand to profit from a mutually-beneficial relationship this season.

Findlay became a mainstay of McInnes’ defence at Kilmarnock throughout 2023 and 2024, now he will begin the new Scottish Premiership campaign as a starting Hearts centre-back. Aberdeen visit Tynecastle on Monday evening to begin a new league season which is eagerly anticipated in Gorgie. Findlay is one of seven new arrivals so far, with more to follow, and the 29-year-old is ready for action.

He is on loan from Oxford United until next summer but it will be a major surprise if he does not sign a permanent contract. He is a man McInnes relies on, and who is motivated to maximise the opportunity at Hearts. A previous move to MLS side Philadelphia Union did not work out after he rejected the advances of former Tynecastle manager Robbie Neilson. Findlay is not in Oxford’s plans either and feels that working with McInnes is certain to help him reach optimum form.

“Yeah, it's absolutely massive for me,” he said. “Over the last couple of years I've had a couple of big moves to America and then my move to Oxford. I’ll be the first to admit that, both times, I've probably not excelled as much as I want to. That’s me being totally honest about that. So coming to a new club like Hearts, there's such demands on the club, to have a manager in your corner that's backed you for two years, that's shown he believes in you, to have that beside of you going into a new club, I think it was only ever going to be a benefit.

“Hopefully I've shown him so far in the games that I've played that I'm here to do a job and I'm ready to perform for him. I don't think you realise how big a club Hearts is until you're involved in it. Obviously, you come to Tynecastle once or twice a season, you know they're a big side, but then you come here and you see how passionate the fans are - how big a crowd we can get for Craigie’s [Gordon] testimonial, for example.

“Not only that, just the demand for success at a club like Hearts is something that I'm really happy to be a part of. When the manager spoke to me, we were both wanting to come here because we both knew what success looked like at Hearts. It's something that we both aligned ourselves with. So we're going to have to back it up and make sure we put in the performances to reach the ambitions.

“With the size of the club, yeah, I maybe underestimated it slightly. Now that I'm here, I couldn't be any happier to realise what this club can be and what this club I think can achieve. I'm determined to be a part of it. Anybody that's played under him will tell you, the manager deals a lot in trust. He gets players that he knows he can trust. I think he's got a changing room just now full of boys that he knows are going to give him everything. I think he has come into a changing room which is going to suit his style of management.

“You've got boys you can put on the park and they don't need to be walked through the game. They can do the jobs that need to be done as long as we get the instruction before, which obviously the manager is going to give us. For the last two years, he's put me out there and I know that he's got the faith in me. I think we've had a really good relationship because of that. It's something I was really eager to continue and I'm really happy that I'm here and getting the chance to do that.”

Premier Sports Cup groups done, now it’s the SPFL Premiership for Hearts

Results would indicate the relationship is off to an encouraging start. Hearts breezed through the Premier Sports Cup group stage with four wins from four and then beat English Premier League side Sunderland 3-0 in Gordon’s testimonial. They have yet to concede a goal with Findlay on the pitch. The decision to hang his hat on McInnes again looks to be a sound one.

“I'll be the first to admit, when I had the option to leave Oxford on a loan to go back to Kilmarnock, I didn't have many options. I’ll be totally honest with you,” explained the defender. “When Derek McInnes came in for me at Kilmarnock, he was a manager that obviously I respected greatly, it was a club that meant a lot to me. It worked at the time, and I think for him to get me from where I was two years previous to where I was at the end of his tenure at Kilmarnock, I think it would be absolute madness for me not to want to continue that working relationship.

“He is a manager that knows what my skillset is, he knows how to get the best out of me, and as I said, when I got the chance to work with him again, it was something I just couldn't knock back. Not only that, to come to a club of the stature of Hearts, as I said I didn't realise that. I had the chance a few years ago before I moved to America, but now that I'm here and I see what the club is all about, I'm delighted to get another bite of the cherry. To be able to do it with an extra four or five years experience behind me, I think me and the club are going to benefit from that.

“I don't think it was any secret back then, I think it was Robbie Neilson who was the manager, I was very, very close to joining Hearts. The opportunity that I got in America was something at the time I couldn't knock back. It was a massive opportunity which maybe just didn't work out football-wise the way that I wanted, but it's not something I regret. It's something that I definitely wouldn't have got the chance to do again, so it's something I had to explore at the time.

“As I said, there's always that little gnawing feeling in the back of your head of ‘what could have happened if I went elsewhere?’ To be able to come here, I think as a better player to what I was back then, with a manager who fully knows what I'm about, it can only be a positive for me.”

One thing Findlay does regret is his situation at parent club Oxford, where he is out of the picture with a year left on his contract. A permanent move to Hearts seems inevitable, and again the player is brutally honest about his fate there. “It's a bit of a strange situation that I've got with Oxford,” he remarked. “I would first admit that the year I was down there I didn't set the heather alight. I was really disappointed. I maybe wasn't in the right place mentally and physically that I wanted to be when I was at Oxford, but these things happen. Football players take dips at certain times.

“I thought they'd maybe made their mind up that I just wasn't the idea for them. I can't blame them because I didn't produce the way I did. At the same time, when you've got a manager who wants you as much as the gaffer here did, I think both clubs were happy to get something done in the meantime. I can't worry about what other clubs are wanting, I just only worry about the club where I am, and that's Hearts. I just really want to have a good year for Hearts now.”

Critics point to McInnes’ playing style at Kilmarnock as not being entertaining, but Findlay feels that is unjust. “Especially on the [astroturf] pitch that we had, we got that little tag for ourselves. Personally, being at the club, I thought was maybe unfair at the time,” he said. “Then you come here and, with the forward options he's got at his disposal, I think it shows in the goals that we've scored in the Premier Sports Cup. We have won every game by at least three or four goals, including the Sunderland friendly.

“I think he has shown that there's going to be attacking football, but it's going to be aggressive front-foot football, which he's also been known for. If you add that to the skillset and the attacking options that we've got, then I can see it being a really good combination.”

Findlay is an experienced Scottish football campaigner who knows the level of expectation from Hearts fans. To some extent, that can lead to increased pressure. “Yes and no,” he said. “I think there's that demand to win football matches, but no matter where I've been in my career, I want to win football games. When we were at Kilmarnock, when we finished fourth, that wasn't seen as a bonus, that was what I wanted to do that year.

“At Hearts, I just want to win every game of football. I think we've got a good enough squad that we can beat anybody on our day, and it's all about making sure we produce that on the day. As I said, I'm a winner, I want to win games, and I think that aligns perfectly with what this club is all about.”

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