THE received wisdom in football – for players and managers – is that you should never go back to a club where you once enjoyed success. It's never been quite clear why this maxim is held in such high regard but certainly when it comes to managerial figures in recent Scottish football history it doesn't really stand up to scrutiny.

Neil Lennon did it and has won one trophy fewer in his second spell as Celtic manager than he did first time around; Walter Smith returned to Rangers in 2007 and added eight further leagues and cups to the 13 he had won during his first spell at Ibrox. Of course taking Old Firm clubs as an example is not always the best exercise since squads, budgets and resources are much more abundant but even at Hearts where Robbie Neilson has just returned for his second stint, there is a precedent. No, Craig Levein's second spell in charge could hardly be described as a roaring success but then neither was Jim Jefferies' second posting at Tynecastle a disaster, steering the Edinburgh club to a third-place finish following a turbulent end to the Cszaba Laszlo reign.

Making sense of some of the movements in Scottish football is rarely an exact science and never more was that demonstrated by events on Sunday night when Neilson agreed to a return to the capital on a three-year deal.

Speaking on the BBC Sportsound podcast yesterday both former director of football, Craig Levein, and ex-captain Stephen Pressley, said Neilson's relationship with Anne Budge had been a telling factor and, so too, the availability of funds to build. Whether James Anderson has extended his largesse to give Hearts more funds to work with remains to be seen but the impression is that the club does not appear to be struggling financially – witness the offer of a two-year deal to Celtic goalkeeper Craig Gordon – despite the pandemic and Budge's efforts to force pay cuts for players.

Only last week, Hearts took legal action aimed at preventing Dundee United's promotion to the Premiership, citing the examples of how clubs in Belgium and France had their relegations halted. A matter of days later they were opening dialogue over compensation for the manager that had guided United into Hearts' spot in the top flight. Cynics might suggest that there might be more to see here but in reality Hearts are likely merely to have activated a release clause leaving Neilson – keen to resume unfinished business according to Levein – free to return to the club he joined at the age of 15.

Strikingly there has been barely a murmur of dissent from those at Tannadice. On message boards, supporters expressed gratitude that Neilson had guided them to promotion but they were not exactly devastated at the departure of a manager who had recorded a 57 per cent win ratio during his time charge – and they were equally grateful that they would no longer be subjected to what they referred to as “boring football”.

That charge has been a recurring theme for Neilson. It was the main accusation when he was in the Tynecastle manager's seat first time around. Again his win ratio was in the high 50s during that spell between 2014 and 2016 but a section of supporters in Gorgie could not forgive a Scottish Cup capitulation and subsequent replay defeat at the hands of city rivals Hibernian in February of that same year, famously hiring a small aircraft a month later to fly overhead trailing a slogan that read “No style No Bottle Neilson out!” just as a league match against Partick Thistle kicked off. A game, it must be noted that Hearts won 1-0.

And that was the issue for too many: the style was lacking. Good football is always subjective yet, it's not something you would immediately associate with Hearts' recent history, or for that matter any club in Scottish football outwith the Old Firm over the past 20 years. Two teams: the 1998 Scottish Cup-winning side and George Burley's 2006 league challengers could realistically lay claim to being stylish.

Lennon's Hibs side were certainly attractive when they finished fourth in their first season back in the Premiership, winning 18 times and scoring 62 goals but their record was almost identical to that of Neilson's Championship new boys in 2016-16 who won the same number of games, albeit scoring three goals fewer.

In short, if you want to watch mouthwatering, exhilarating football then perhaps the SPFL is not the place for you.

One would imagine the opposition to Neilson's return will be less vocal this time around. You can directly pinpoint the beginning of Hearts' woes to his departure first time around and it makes sense whatever the club's fate.

Should Hearts find themselves playing in the Championship in the new campaign then they have a manager who has demonstrated himself well equipped to earn promotion with limited fuss. Should they win their legal appeal and find themselves reinstated to the Premiership then he has the credentials from his first reign to hold up to his critics.

You would figure that he has become a better manager since then – notwithstanding his ill-starred spell at MK Dons – and it will be interesting to see how he copes without Levein there.

In Liam Boyce, Conor Washington and Steven Naismith he has a strike force capable of hitting between 60 and 70 goals at least next season. At his disposal is a squad that is full of quality players such as Craig Halkett, Livingston's player of the year two seasons ago, Scotland defender John Souttar and Sean Clare who was starting to show signs of life under Daniel Stendel. If the majority remain in place, Neilson and Hearts have enough to render the painful memory of 2020 a relative blip by this time next year.