Hearts: From top of league to second cup final, via relegation & courts

Hearts face Celtic on Sunday in a repeat of the 2019 Scottish Cup final

In little over two years, Hearts have gone from top of the Scottish Premiership to a chaotic descent to the second tier.

Having clattered every rung on the way down as civil war threatened to rip Scottish football apart, wounds are beginning to heal at the Edinburgh club.

Robbie Neilson's side are on track for an instant top-flight return and Sunday's Scottish Cup final at Hampden - held over from last season - offers the chance of a first major trophy since 2012.

Here, BBC Scotland charts the Tynecastle turbulence from pitch to boardroom to courtroom.

The moment it turned sour

With Craig Levein at the helm, Hearts made a turbo-charged start to season 2018-19 with eight wins from 10 and topped the table for three months. Even Brendan Rodgers' Celtic couldn't keep pace.

Then came the League Cup semi-final at Murrayfield. It proved a cataclysmic turning point with Steven Naismith left grimacing in agony as collateral damage, limping off early before Hearts collapsed to a 3-0 defeat to Celtic.

The absence of talisman and top scorer Naismith - to the first of two knee injuries which required surgery that season - proved a stretch too far for a squad already depleted by injuries to Christophe Berra, John Souttar and Uche Ikpeazu.

Hearts didn't just wobble, they crumpled in a heap with one win in nine dropping them to fifth by Christmas. And their end to the season - one point from seven games - was as dreadful as their start had been dazzling.

Another chance of silverware

The Scottish Cup presented the gleaming prospect of salvation. The draw had been favourable, with Livingston the only top-tier opposition Hearts faced in the run to their second final of the campaign.

But you can only beat what's in front of you, and the Tynecastle side's late-season Premiership nosedive can partly be explained by their switch of focus to the lure of Hampden silverware.

If the journey had been straightforward, the final step was anything but as Celtic - needing victory to complete an unprecedented treble treble - again stood between Hearts and glory.

Levein's men had already turned over the champions that season, winning 1-0 Tynecastle, but defeat in all four subsequent meetings illustrated the size of their task.

Hearts seized the initiative, with Ryan Edwards opening the scoring. However, with one hand on the trophy, it was ripped from their grasp as an Odsonne Edouard double made history for Celtic.

Levein swapped for Stendel

Craig Levein was sacked with Hearts only off the bottom on goal difference

If those two cup defeats were sore ones, it was nothing compared to the trauma to come.

A rot had set in and there was no shifting it. The new season brought the same old failings as Hearts took two points from their first five games to prop up the table. A 2-1 Edinburgh win at Easter Road was a fleeting moment of euphoria amid the gloom.

The churn of injuries and unconvincing singings had taken a heavy toll and Levein was sacked on Halloween after one victory all season. Despite also being axed as director of football, Levein hung around in a background role to see out his contract until May.

After a laborious five-week search, former Barnsley boss Daniel Stendel was appointed Levein's dugout replacement. The German would serve just a few months of his two-year deal and a new manager bounce was conspicuously lacking as he began with a run of four straight league defeats.

There were highs - memorable Tynecastle wins over Rangers in league and cup and a stunning derby success at Hibernian - but Hearts remained rooted in trouble as their switch to a high-tempo pressing game too often misfired.

'Unjust' demotion & legal fight

Stendel's final match was to take on apocalyptic proportions. A win at St Mirren could have moved Hearts off the bottom, but they lost 1-0 to fall four points adrift with 24 still to play for.

It would be the last domestic matched played for almost five months as Covid-19 took hold. Weeks of turmoil ensued as it became increasingly clear the campaign would not be completed.

Bitterness and rancour boiled over as a consensus was sought. And, after a ballot of all 42 SPFL clubs, Dundee's controversial change of vote tipped the decision in favour of calling the season, with Hearts officially relegated on 18 May.

The pandemonium was far from finished. A league-commissioned investigation into the voting process came and went, as did reconstruction proposals that would have saved Hearts.

Chairman Ann Budge, refusing to accept her club's "unjust" demotion, took the battle all the way to the courts, a legal process ultimately costing £646,000. It was more fighting sprit than many of the players had shown on the pitch.

Budge was adamant no club should be "unfairly penalised" amid the pandemic, but the endgame came when Hearts' demotion was confirmed by an independent tribunal on 28 July.

Picking up the pieces

Robbie Neilson (right) has steered Hearts to the Championship summit and Scottish Cup final

From the club's darkest hour, a new dawn has emerged. Neilson, having led Dundee United to the top flight, made a shock return to manage Hearts for a second time.

A specialist in promotion from the Championship - he took the Tynecastle side up in 2015 - Neilson has helped restore positivity.

A new-look team - 15 players left in June - have raced four points clear seven matches into the truncated 27-game second tier. The signings of Craig Gordon, Andy Halliday, Stephen Kingsley and Josh Ginnelly look inspired in a side averaging three goals per league game.

The shock League Cup last-16 loss to Alloa Athletic aside, Hearts are beating again and Edinburgh rivals Hibs were dispatched at Hampden in the Scottish Cup semi-final to set up the crack at Celtic.

Should they deny Neil Lennon's side the quadruple treble, few could begrudge Hearts their moment of triumph after a catalogue of trauma.