WHERE DID MONEY GO? ASKS GORDON

CRAIG GORDON fears a six-figure sum he handed back to Hearts simply disappeared down a black hole in the final days of Vladimir Romanov’s reign at Tynecastle. The keeper’s £9million move from Gorgie to Sunderland in 2007 made him the most valued British player in his position. Contractually entitled to a slice of the huge sum Hearts banked for him, Gordon opted to waive the money and asked that it be invested in the same youth development structure that had nurtured him. But as he prepares to face his old club for the first time on league business today, Gordon remains unconvinced it was ever used for the purposes he intended. ‘When I left Hearts, I didn’t take anything with me from the transfer fee or any signing-on fees. I left that with the club,’ he revealed. ‘Maybe it would have been better if I had taken it with me so I could put it back in now. ‘I waived what I could have taken. I thought that was the thing to do. ‘The club did well by me. They gave me my chance to come through and showed a great deal of faith in me. They put me on a good contract before I left.

‘I certainly didn’t feel the need to take any more than was necessary. I did say I would rather leave it to the youth development which had helped me. To put it towards perhaps a few more players coming through.’ Asked if it annoyed him that — in all probability — then development chief John Murray wouldn’t have seen the money, Gordon added: ‘Yes, it did. Maybe it did go towards youth development, maybe it didn’t. I’ve no idea. ‘But it would have been nice if a certain percentage of that had managed to filter through.’ Romanov’s regime imploded two years ago when the club entered administration, only for the combined power of Foundation of Hearts and Ann Budge to save it. The club have since returned to the top flight but Gordon feared they could just as easily have been wiped off the football map. ‘I thought it was a possibility. I think it would have come back somehow, whatever route it had to go down to do that. ‘Obviously, the pleasing part is to keep the club as it was, although it had an administration to emerge from. For it still to be the same club with the same history is massive for the fans.’