The Sun's Bill Leckie summed up the difference between Inverness and Hibs on Saturday pretty well - Caley's Dougie Imrie covered every blade of grass and kept going even when his efforts were not necessarily paying off. In contrast Derek Riordan, banished to the left touchline, demonstrated a sulky demeanour more in keeping with Harry Enfield's satirical teenager Kevin. The way he was going on, Deeks might have at any moment given a shout of "I hate you! This is so unfair!".
Riordan was the most obvious, but certainly not the only, example of the malaise that appears to affect the Easter Road club currently. Certainly all has not been well since Tony Mowbray left in October 2006, with his successor, John Collins, hardly finding favour with the locals either despite a league cup triumph. Mixu Paatelainen, who on Saturday in his thick winter coat and sporting a glum, pained expression resembled a teletubby midway through a drug rehab programme, has now been in the hotseat for 13 months. And it has been hot indeed.
On the face of it, the situation hardly seems perilous. Hibs lie seventh in the table after Saturday's defeat, only a point off the top six. However, on closer inspection, they have won only eight league games all season, and in all competitions they have won only four of the last nineteen. By all accounts, the team is in a bit of a state. Saturday's tactics were just bizarre, with Jonatan Johansson up front, Steven Fletcher playing much too deep (to the point that he rarely touched the ball in the final third all day) and Riordan stuck out wide where he could make as much impact on the match as Jade Goody might make at an astrophysics conference. Take Rob Jones off the pitch and the team is an utter disaster.
The Hibee fans spent most of the match calling for big Mixu's head to be delivered to them on a plate. Increasingly it looks like their request will be granted. Hibs hardly have the quality available that Mowbray was blessed with, in the days of Scott Brown, Kevin Thomson and Steven Whittaker, but they have to do better than this. Considering the Butcher bandwagon is building up a head of steam, and the fact that Falkirk surely have enough quality to get some more points on the board, Hibernian could yet, despite their current ten point cushion, be dragged into what could well be the mother of all dogfights at the bottom of this league.
L.
Riordan was the most obvious, but certainly not the only, example of the malaise that appears to affect the Easter Road club currently. Certainly all has not been well since Tony Mowbray left in October 2006, with his successor, John Collins, hardly finding favour with the locals either despite a league cup triumph. Mixu Paatelainen, who on Saturday in his thick winter coat and sporting a glum, pained expression resembled a teletubby midway through a drug rehab programme, has now been in the hotseat for 13 months. And it has been hot indeed.
On the face of it, the situation hardly seems perilous. Hibs lie seventh in the table after Saturday's defeat, only a point off the top six. However, on closer inspection, they have won only eight league games all season, and in all competitions they have won only four of the last nineteen. By all accounts, the team is in a bit of a state. Saturday's tactics were just bizarre, with Jonatan Johansson up front, Steven Fletcher playing much too deep (to the point that he rarely touched the ball in the final third all day) and Riordan stuck out wide where he could make as much impact on the match as Jade Goody might make at an astrophysics conference. Take Rob Jones off the pitch and the team is an utter disaster.
The Hibee fans spent most of the match calling for big Mixu's head to be delivered to them on a plate. Increasingly it looks like their request will be granted. Hibs hardly have the quality available that Mowbray was blessed with, in the days of Scott Brown, Kevin Thomson and Steven Whittaker, but they have to do better than this. Considering the Butcher bandwagon is building up a head of steam, and the fact that Falkirk surely have enough quality to get some more points on the board, Hibernian could yet, despite their current ten point cushion, be dragged into what could well be the mother of all dogfights at the bottom of this league.
L.
No comments:
Post a Comment