THE long wait for Hearts supporters is finally over. After a little over a month, the Tynecastle board appointed former Barnsley manager Daniel Stendel as Craig Levein's successor in the Gorgie club's dugout.
Some fans were getting a little impatient after interim manager Austin MacPhee failed to revitalise the capital club's fortunes in the intervening period, but it seems as though Ann Budge's decision to hold off and get the right candidate has paid off.
Of course, no-one can say for certain one way or the other if Stendel will be a success at Hearts. But his track record suggests that while he might have a big job on his hands - more on that later - he has certainly shown lots of promise in his relatively short management career to date.
READ MORE: Angelo Alessio wary of Ross County's Highland giant Ross Stewart
Who is Daniel Stendel?
The 45-year-old spent the majority of his playing career at German side Hannover 96 and joined the club's coaching staff once he retired in 2008. Stendel's coaching career started off as an assistant for Hannover's reserve side, then the German took charge of two of the club's youth teams before landing the role as manager of the senior team in April 2016.
By that time, Hannover were all but relegated from the Bundesliga and Stendel was tasked with bringing them back into the top flight at the first time of asking. However, Stendel was sacked in March the following year in what were perhaps harsh circumstances. Hannover were fourth in the table - one place off the crucial promotion spots - and were just four points behind league leaders Union Berlin, yet Stendel was still dismissed from his post.
It took Stendel just over a year to land his next management role when he took charge of English outfit Barnsley. Similarly to his brief at Hannover, Stendel was asked to rebuild a team that had suffered relegation in the previous campaign and achieve promotion immediately.
This time, he did so admirably. Barnsley finished the season in second place in England's League One, just three points behind eventual champions Luton Town. Barnsley finished the campaign with the fewest goals conceded in the entire division and were unbeaten at home all season. But once promotion was confirmed, things got much, much harder for Stendel.
Centre-backs Liam Lindsay, Ethan Pinnock and Kieffer Moore were all sold to other Championship sides for a total of around £7.5 million, decimating the defence that Stendel had ticking so well. Barnsley supporters have accused the club's owners of asset stripping and cashing in on prized players, and were left thoroughly disillusioned when Stendel was sacked earlier this season. Upon his departure, the general feeling from the club's fanbase was one of disappointment at the board and gratitude towards Stendel, for the exciting brand of tooball that he brought to the club.
READ MORE: Hibernian midfielder Joe Newell in race to be fit for Celtic trip
What style of play can Hearts supporters expect?
Throughout his 100 matches as a first-team manager, Stendel generally prefers his teams to line up in a 4-2-3-1 formation with a heavy emphasis placed on pressing the opposition when out of possession. This gegenpress style, perhaps best exemplified by Jurgen Klopp's Dortmund side that won the Bundesliga two years in a row and reached the Champions League final in 2013, is fairly in vogue at the moment but demands a fair bit from the players who play within it.
This tactical system needs energetic, dynamic players in order to fully function and this may well raise concerns with some sections of the Hearts support. First-team stalwarts such as Steven Naismith, Glenn Whelan and Christophe Berra aren't getting younger and may find it difficult to adapt to a system so rooted in mobility.
READ MORE: Why Livingston's Stevie Lawless deserves more recognition
What needs to be fixed?
First and foremost, Stendel has to ensure that his Hearts side believe they are capable of winning matches once again. The capital club have picked up just four points from losing positions this season and it is essential that Stendel brings a new mindest to his players and instills a sense of determination and fight into them. All too often, Hearts have fallen behind with no apparent desire to pull themselves back into contention in a match.
Making the attack click will be the next-highest priority for the new Hearts boss, as the Tynecastle club's woes in front of goal this campaign is one of the key reasons that they find themselves in a relegation battle. Only St Mirren (12) and St Johnstone (13) have hit fewer goals than the 16 that Hearts have managed this term and serious improvement is required in this area if Stendel's side are to rise up the rankings.
At the back, though, reasons for positivity can be found. While Hearts have conceded the fifth-most goals in the Premiership this season, they have the fourth-lowest expected goals against (xGA) on any top-flight side. In essence, this means that Hearts can perhaps consider themselves a little unfortunate to have conceded as many goals as they have already and given time, they should concede fewer.
Goalkeeper remains something of a problem position at Tynecastle and this partly explains the relatively high number of goals conceded compared to the club's xGA. Colin Doyle, Zdenek Zlamal and Joel Pereira have all featured between the sticks at various points this season and none have exactly made the position their own. Once this is rectified, either by bringing in a new face in the January transfer window or improving one of the current crop, we should expect the Hearts defence to be a little less leaky going forward. Stendel's track record at Barnsley suggests that he has the skill-set to create a well-marshalled defence and somewhat surprisingly, Hearts' underlying defensive stats this season aren't all that bad.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article