York City boss Billy McEwan is reeling after key signing Greg Heald walked out of the club in a dramatic U-turn.

The 33-year-old centre-half signed for the Minstermen last week after several weeks of talks.

Now he has changed his mind in a move that McEwan says has cost him several weeks of precious transfer market negotiation time.

The City boss said: "It's a major blow to us. He's wasted my time really. We had been talking to him for three or four weeks so for him to come in and say to me that he didn't want to play is just staggering.

"It has hampered our plans as other players that we were looking at at the time, who we would have pursued, have since gone to other clubs.

"We have still got players in mind but it's a case of hoping they haven't signed elsewhere - he's set me three or four weeks back."

Heald, who was surprisingly released by Rochdale at the end of last season despite playing 32 matches, told the Evening Press shortly after signing he felt that York was 'the right move'.

He said: "I felt it was imperative that I found another team. I did not want to leave it too late and find myself without a club.

"I was lucky enough for Billy to come in for me and I was more than willing to sign for a good club like York.

"I feel this is the right move for me. It's still a big club as far as I'm concerned and there still seems to be ambition here to get back to where it deserves to be - in the League."

Those words will offer little comfort to McEwan, who now faces a race against time to plug the gap and has called for measures that would make players pay for such actions.

He said: "When things like that happen I think that players should be fined. He signed for us and you just can't sign for a club one day and then change your mind a few days later.

"It's staggering. He's probably going to sign for someone else - we are not nave. The lad says that he's not got another club but he must think we are stupid in this neck of the woods to believe that."

He added: "He said he panicked into the decision and realised after a few days that he had made the wrong decision.

"It's very, very disappointing for us and the fans. He had been over a couple of times so he knew what the driving situation was and we had made arrangements to help with transport costs.

"It's bad news but we move on - it's not the end of the world. We only want players who want to play for York City."

Updated: 10:03 Tuesday, July 05, 2005