Hampden holds no hoodoo, since Gray got the winner on 90+2…
“Hibs are going to Hampden” are five words that have become
as familiar to Hibs fans as the sound of our own breathing, the rising of the
sun and every word spoken on Time for Heroes – including the bit where you had
to listen really hard Anthony Stokes when he described The Rangers defence as
“fragile” given the molasses like thickness of his Irish accent.
It’s become so familiar that after Hibs 3-1 victory over Ayr
United fans took to Twitter and amusingly commented that they were making
enquiries into getting a season ticket at the national stadium (A.K.A Easter
Road West) while others noted that there are plans to build a third dressing
room so that there’s one for Queens Park, one for the visiting team and another
for Hibs.
If the record books are correct then this is an entirely
unique situation for Hibs in as much as we’re going into the Scottish Cup Semi-Final
as holders of the Scottish Cup for the first time in our history. The briefest
of research reveals that in Season 1902/03 Dundee knocked Hibs out at the third
time of asking at the Quarter-Final stage (the original fixture and the replay
not being enough to separate the two sides) and while Wikipedia is a bit scant
on detail when it comes to Season 1887/88, it’s complete enough to know that
Hibs didn’t make the Semi-Final and a team called Renton won it.
This is also the first time, at least in recent memory, that
Hibs have gone into a Scottish Cup Semi Final completely unburdened by our
history in the competition. It bears repeating (not like anyone has forgotten,
not that we’ll let anyone forget) that Hibs won the Scottish Cup for the first
time in 114 years on 21st May 2016, the magnitude of the event being
something that only Hibs fans truly understand the meaning of, something we’ll
never tire of hearing, seeing or reading about. It’s one of the reasons I’m
writing this right now because the circumstances of this competition, of this
Semi-Final and what it could lead to are so, so different.
When Hibs faced Dundee United in last year’s Scottish Cup
Semi-Final we were coming off the back of a defeat against Ross County in the
League Cup a month earlier and in the midst of a pretty poor run of form. Three
defeats on the spin preceded the League Cup Final followed by two draws and two
defeats before we played Dundee United in the Scottish Cup Semi-Final.
LLLLLDLD.
I remember my friends and my brother and I all walking to
Hampden on 16th April 2016 with a blasé attitude. We’d had the
customary couple of drinks before the game but the atmosphere was subdued when
you take into account thatHibs were in the Scottish Cup Semi-Final. There was
no pre-match excitement for us, no running about in the weeks before ensuring
we were on supporters and. There wasn’t even the usual scramble for tickets. We
went through on the train, had a quiet couple of pints and made our way towards
the ground knowing that, no matter what, we were going out for tea afterwards
as we had all simply dispersed after the Ross County game and made our way to
our respective homes. I couldn’t remember exactly why we felt that way, particularly
since events of 21st May 2016 have coloured everything since so I
asked my friend why he thought that was. I didn’t ask if I could use his full
name so let’s just call him Budgie.
He said “I honestly think the League Cup Final against Ross
County had killed the optimism that you usually attribute to an appearance at
Hampden.
The disappointments I can consciously remember are blinded
by the League Cup Final in 2007 and winning the Scottish Cup in 2016 but I
think before the Semi-Final against Dundee United we had a real concentrated
period of repeated disappointments. You had the Hearts debacle in 2012 followed
by the Celtic final the following year where we were never in the game. Then
there’s the Falkirk Semi-Final which we inexplicably lost followed by Ross
County where we maybe didn’t deserve to win but definitely didn’t deserve to
lose.
On top of our relationship with Hampden, Hibs had conspired
to get relegated. One win in 19 games would have seen us fine. One win. Relegated in the same year as
Hearts went on to run riot in the league while we got knocked out of the
playoffs from a Rangers team we were much better than. How could you have
possibly been optimistic after experiencing all that in such a short space of
time?
Going to Hampden on 16th April 2016 we knew that
Oxley was suspended following a booking for wasting time / losing a contact
lens, it transpires later that Virtanen has shat it during the week and Logan’s
in goals. Everyone is thinking ‘look at the nick of him’, Cummings lobs the
ball over the goal with his penalty. Mixu was in charge of them, Rankin was
playing and Anier was in the squad. It was all adding up to another
disappointment so rather than wallow in self-pity about it, we made a conscious
decision of not to give a fuck about the result”
When Cummings missed his penalty and after our jaws had
joined the rest of our face from of the floor, one of us remarked that “this is
how it happens”. Basically, this is how we make a mess of it, this is how we
lose and this is how the Scottish Cup eludes us again, without ever reaching
the final. It was to turn into a running joke for the remainder of the game.
Every time United were through on goal, “this is how it happens”. When Rankin
has his dig at goal “this is how it happens”. When Anier was introduced late in
the game “this is how it happens”. Logan, however, defied all our expectations
and was simply phenomenal during that game saving everything that was put his
way including two penalties in the penalty shoot-out. In the space of an hour
or so “this is how it happens” changed from this is how we get knocked out to
“this is how IT happens”.
Given our league form at the time of the Ross County defeat
I said to my friends that Hibs needed to focus solely on the Scottish Cup the
reason being that no-one would remember if we got promoted whereas no-one would
ever forget if we did the unthinkable and won the Scottish Cup. Hibs didn’t focus
solely on the Scottish Cup but instead professionally went about trying to gain
entry into the Premier League via the Championship Playoffs while continuing to
battle for the Scottish Cup.
Hibs fell short in the league and finished third behind The
Rangers and Falkirk which meant two ties against Raith Rovers who we beat on
aggregate over two legs before eventually exiting the competition following a
two-legged aggregate defeat against Falkirk. I remember coming away from The
Falkirk Stadium trying to console my brother (again) who was thinking of
jacking the whole thing in and giving up his season ticket (again) and thinking
out loud that David Gray hadn’t had a great game and that Niklas Gunnersson
might be a better choice at right back for the Scottish Cup Final 9 days later –
can you imagine how different the world would look now if Stubbs had listened
to my pish? Unthinkable.
Our form at the start of this year has been mixed. We had reason to be optimistic following four
wins in January but it was followed by mixed fortunes in February that
continued into March. A draw against Ayr preceded a nil-nil draw against Hearts
in the Scottish Cup tie at Tynecastle. Hibs then shared the points in another
draw against Raith Rovers with the Hibs team putting in a performance so poor that
Neil Lennon gave a scathing critique of his players in his post-match radio
interview which seemed to have the desired effect as Hibs then absolutely demolished
Premier League opponents Hearts in the Scottish Cup replay 3-1 at Easter Road,
a game where Andrew Shinnie replaced the injured Chris Humphrey after just a
few minutes in an unfamiliar left-wing position but delivered as good a
performance as anyone else on the pitch.
Hibs then had a quite stunning collapse against Dunfermline
at Easter Road after going two goals up (which in my opinion had as much to do
with Liam Fontaine’s injury, leaving Hibs with only one fit centre half and
Dunfermline sensing we were there for the taking) before losing 2-0 at St.
Mirren in a midweek encounter in Paisley.
Is it perhaps understandable then on seeing the odds of Ayr
United beating Hibs / qualifying from the tie at 10/1 and 11/2 respectively
that I thought they were a touch generous and put a reluctant fiver on each? Not
that I wanted Hibs to lose because I never want Hibs to lose but I felt that
injuries (Hanlon, Forster, Fontaine, McGeouch, Humphrey), suspensions
(McGregor) and a loss of form (Fyvie) had simply taken their toll on a Hibs
team previously depleted by injuries to key players and it might in fact
benefit Hibs not to have to face any additional games.
And yet…
Hibs put their inconsistent league form to one side to beat
Ayr 3-1 in a tie we never looked like losing and have now made the Semi-Finals
for something like the sixth time in the last 10 years.
Maybe it’s because winning the Scottish Cup felt like (and
was celebrated like) a once in a lifetime deal that I hadn’t given much thought
to winning it again and had allowed myself to be side tracked by other
so-called ‘priorities’ (E.G. The league) but our history with the competition
means that the idea of winning it again must surely occupy the same part of the
brain where all the memories of 21st May 2016 reside. This is for
the time being at least, OUR cup and it took so long for us to get our hands on
it that this Hibs side and the supporters have zero desire to let it slip from
our grasp without a fight…or a party.
The noise that Hibs fans have generated since that opening tie
at Tynecastle, but from the full house at Easter Road in the Scottish Cup
replay under the lights in particular, has been nothing short of breath taking
and the party atmosphere that follows Hibs in the cup is something that I think
has been instrumental in our performances and in getting us to the Semi-Final
once more. Graeme Hunter’s “We are Hibs” (Hibs, woah-oh-oh-oh-oh Hibs, Hibs)
has quickly cemented itself as a Hibs anthem. The original recording was a
fantastically creative bit of song writing and Graeme deserves credit for
recording it and uploading it to YouTube. I wonder how he feels hearing his own
voice coming over the speakers at Easter Road? And does he sing “Fuck your
1902” with as much GET IT RIGHT FUCKING UP YE as I do?
A recent and classic bit of Hibs footage shows cult hero ‘King’
Dom Malonga scoring a sublime solo effort. He takes a long clearance from John
McGinn in his stride on the halfway line, ghosts between three players and calmly
slots the ball past the stranded goalkeeper. Malonga’s plying his trade in
Italy again however our opponents in the Scottish Cup Semi-Final, the team King
Dom scored against and helped Hibs knock out on our way to the League Cup Final
are none other than Aberdeen.
We’ve got a good record against The Dons in cup competition
in the last few years and we no longer have the weight of history holding us
back. We can play without fear. We could beat Aberdeen and we could make the final.
Could this be how IT happens…again?
