Hearts are heading to Spain for a pre-season training camp next week and it’s the best possible way for new boys to
integrate into the squad and get to know their team-mates.
Believe me, that can be a daunting prospect, no matter how confident you might appear to be on the outside. Walking into a new dressing room for the first time, particularly when you don’t know anybody, can make the legs turn to jelly and the butterflies are always churning in the stomach.
I had it everywhere I went – but nothing will beat my first day at training with Ipswich after I left the first time in 2012. I knew nobody and I realised none of the boys would have a clue who I was, having come down from the SPL as it was then, and when I walked into the dressing room I was told my locker was right next to Jimmy Bullard’s.
