Hearts stopper Marian Kello no longer has the patience to go back to bench-warming with contract fast running out

MARIAN KELLO'S long-term future appears uncertain with less than six months remaining on his current Hearts deal. He is willing to extend his stay at Tynecastle, but only provided he can establish himself as the club's first-choice goalkeeper.

The Slovakian signed a one-year agreement with Hearts last summer having spent last season on loan from the Lithuanian club FBK Kaunas. After an inactive start to the campaign he replaced the injured Janos Balogh in early December and has not looked back since, performing with an authority that helped underpin the team's recent league revival.

After another impressive display against Aberdeen last weekend, it is reasonable to assume Kello is the favoured choice of his manager, Csaba Laszlo. But perhaps only for the moment. A constant of the Hungarian's 18-month reign has been the fact that no goalkeeper – Balogh, Kello or Jamie MacDonald – has been able to exclusively lay claim to the title of Hearts' No.1.

Kello believes changing that situation and imposing himself permanently is crucial to him remaining in Edinburgh. Clubs in Greece are monitoring his circumstances and, at the age of 27, he has no desire to play a bit-part role at club level.

Hearts officials have yet to approach him about extending his deal beyond the end of the season. The next few months, therefore, would appear critical for both parties. "If I have the possibility to play, of course I would like to stay," Kello told the Evening News.

"It's better than going somewhere else and sitting on the bench. I am a person who wants more experience, maybe from another country, but first of all I want to play. If I feel I have the chance to play here, I will stay here. I don't have a problem with that.

"I'm just trying my best on the pitch. If something is coming, it will come. I'm just waiting until the end of the season.

"I will try my best to go to another level if it's possible.

"This is a question for other people but maybe I will go somewhere else.

"I have a contract here until the summer but I have another agreement with Kaunas. I am still contracted to them for another two years. At the moment, no-one has spoken with me about a new contract at Hearts. It is too soon, I think."

Kello is not the only one harbouring ambitions of a more prominent role at Hearts, of course. Laszlo lured Balogh from the Hungarian club Debrecen 17 months ago with the promise of No.1 status, but his nine-game run before injury at New Douglas Park six weeks ago remains his longest sequence in the side.

MacDonald's predicament is a continual source of frustration to the young Scot, who has featured only eight times in total during Laszlo's tenure and seems unwittingly to have assumed the role of third choice.

Despite an embarrassment of riches in the goalkeeping department, Laszlo is keen for Kello to remain at Tynecastle.

"I would like him to stay, he has shown very good performance," said the manager.

"We now have the new sport director (Alexandr Metlitski] and this is his job. He must talk with the players whose contracts are running out. I heard Jose Goncalves will sit together with the club, and there is also Michael Stewart, Christian Nade and Marian. We have a lot of names who will be out of contract. They must sitwith the new sport director to discuss the future."

For now, Kello revels in the fact that possession is nine tenths of the law for goalkeepers. Gone is the jitteriness which characterised some of last season's outings, most notably in high-profile matches. In its place is an air of decisiveness and confidence, the likes of which Balogh struggled to produce prior to his injury.

The Hungarian is now fit again but has had to content himself with a place on the substitutes' bench while his Slovakian replacement excels.

"I'm very pleased about my play," said Kello. "I'm happy if I make some saves which help our results and make sure we are going up in the table."

He could do little about Saturday's 2-0 defeat in the fourth round of the Scottish Cup. In fact, were it not for Kello's expertise, Aberdeen's victory might have been rather more convincing. He played behind a somewhat makeshift defence containing the on-loan Lithuanian, Marius Cinikas, and 19-year-old Australian Rocky Visconte, who made a top-team debut at left-back.

"I'm happy that I made some saves but I'm not thinking about my performance," continued the goalkeeper.

"I'm not happy with the result and certainly I don't think it was the best performance I have had for Hearts. The last game of last season away at Celtic was maybe better.

"We played some guys together in defence for only the second time, and we had Rocky Visconte at left-back for the first time. Marius Cinikas was only playing his second game. This was not the reason we lost the game. We did not keep the ball up front often enough when we were attacking.

"We wanted to go through in the Cup but we are out. We must be confident to beat St Mirren."

Confidence is an attribute Kello has in abundance at the moment.