HEARTS’ footballers tackled an unexpected opponent on Saturday – when their team bus got wedged under a bridge.
The Jam Tarts lived up to their nickname when the coach became jammed on the last leg of their German tour.
The Edinburgh squad were just 100 metres from their hotel in Aachen after a gruelling four hour journey from Barsinghausen, in the north of Germany, when they came unstuck.
The team had just suffered an embarrassing 2-0 defeat at the hands of German Bundesliga Two outfit St Pauli.
But the SPL players took it all in their stride, with marketing manager Lawrence Brodie – who was on the bus – laughing off any suggestion of drama or injuries.
He said: “To be honest I haven’t heard so much hilarity on the bus in a long time.
“To have come on such a long journey and then hit a hurdle so close to the end, within sight of the hotel, was hysterical. Everyone was killing themselves laughing.
“This was at 10pm so it was light relief for the guys, who had just played in a game and were obviously tired from all the travelling.
“I don’t think there was much damage to the roof but the kit van – which was following the bus – almost got tangled up in it too. It was a good laugh for the lads.”
Up until the excitement of crashing the bus, Hungarian-born boss Csaba Laszlo had spent the journey pointing out his old houses as the bus passed through Cologne.
While the coach calamity cheered the Scottish team up, their good spirits were brought crashing back to earth the next morning when they lost again, this time 4-2 to Alemannia Aachen, also of the German Bundesliga Two.
Lawrence added: “After the crash the bus driver said he was going to support Aachen ahead of our game against them on Sunday.
“It was all good banter and luckily it happened just a minute from the hotel, so it could have been a lot worse.”
