Hearts tie under UEFA order in Azerbaijan

The Conference League begins thousands of miles from Tynecastle

Staging a European tie on the banks of the Caspian Sea is pretty extreme for two clubs whose home grounds are thousands of miles away. Hearts players flying more than six hours to Azerbaijan today will find themselves touching down on the continent’s very periphery at a location where eastern Europe meets western Asia.

They will arrive in the capital city of Baku and begin their UEFA Conference League campaign 25 miles away in Sumqayit on Thursday evening. The 15,000-seat Mehdi Huseynzade Stadium is Dinamo Minsk’s designated home for the competition. The capacity matters little as no supporters from Dinamo or Hearts are allowed inside the ground. The match is closed-doors under UEFA order, hence its relocation from the Belarusian capital.

After Belarus allowed Russia to invade areas of Ukraine from their territory, European football’s governors banned their clubs from staging UEFA matches in the country. Dinamo played four of this summer’s European qualifying ties at the Varosi Stadium in Mezőkövesd, Hungary, but UEFA rules prevent them hosting league-phase ties there.

A Grade 4 venue is required for the Conference League and the Varosi is merely Grade 3. The Grade-4 Mehdi Huseynzade meets all the requirements. It is also available to stage all three of Dinamo’s home ties in this competition as UEFA insist on clubs using one venue only during league-phase matches.

Opened only last year, the home of Azaerbaijan Premier League club Sumqayit FK is a fully-enclosed rectangular-shaped stadium with a modern facade and excellent facilities inside. It sits close to the Caspian Sea’s banks, 2,575 miles from Tynecastle Park and 1,375 miles from the Dinamo Stadium in Minsk. In short, a hell of a long way to go for a game of football. Hearts simply must overcome the geography, Middle Eastern-style surroundings and any fatigue if they want to start purposefully in the new-look Conference League.

The region is hostile. Conflict between Azerbaijan and neighbouring Armenia over the Nagorno-Karabakh territory is a war which has raged for the last 36 years. It involves areas in the west of Azerbaijan near the Armenian border, but chances of peace are increasing since the ethnic Armenian enclave in the area was officially dissolved on 1 January this year. Baku now plans to reintegrate it into Azerbaijan. The location of the dispute is in the west of the country and does not spill across to the east, so Hearts and their staff will be safe. The Formula 1 Grand Prix took place in Baku just two weeks ago and passed off safely.

The considerable travelling is a challenge for both teams, but particularly Hearts. Dinamo’s first summer qualifier this season was against the Armenian club Pyunik Yerevan. They drew 0-0 in Hungary before winning 1-0 in the Armenian Capital, and consequently possess recent experience of the region. Baku is slightly further east, of course, with Sumqayit just up the coast. To underline the distance involved, Baku was a checkpoint in the first series of the popular BBC reality TV show Race Across the World as contenstants navigated routes from London to Singapore.

The Minsk squad is dominated by native players with a sprinkling of foreigners. Brazilian forward Pedro Igor is one of their main threats alongside Belarusian international winger Ivan Bakhar. Denis Polyakov is an experienced centre-back with more than 60 caps for Belarus. Under coach Vadim Skripchenko, they tend to favour a 4-4-2 system which can flip to 4-3-3. However, in the recent derby against FC Minsk, they set up in a 3-4-3 formation and won 2-0. Nigerian striker Steven Alfred and Belarusian forward Dmitriy Podstrelov scored the goals. They kept that system against Isloch on Saturday and recorded the same scoreline. This time Ivorian midfielder Boni Amian struck twice.

Hearts, of course, are under the tutelage of interim manager Liam Fox after sacking Steven Naismith. This will be the first European tie Fox has taken charge of. He is managing his childhood club against theoretically the weakest opponents they will face in this season’s Conference League. Hearts were drawn from Pot 4, Dinamo are from Pot 6. It is a firmly winnable tie, but only if the Tynecastle side can adjust whilst thousands of miles from home.