DAVID GRAY, the man who famously headed Hibs to a late winner in the 2016 Scottish Cup Final, has insisted that the Hibees must aim for a repeat of that feat and lift the trophy in May.
Gray lifted the trophy after Hibs came from 2-1 down to defeat Rangers in the May showpiece at Hampden in 2016. The 29-year-old insisted that his side feared no-one and knew that they could compete with anyone on their day, even Celtic.
“Imagine we won it twice. There’s no reason why not. We have a good squad and we’ve had good success in the cups over recent years.
“We believe we are good enough to win any game on our day, so you never know what could happen in the cups. We have that winning mentality.
“The first couple of minutes of the semi-final last season against Aberdeen were frustrating, but we got a goal back and were unlucky to go on and lose that game. We know on our day we are good enough to compete against the likes of Celtic.”
Speaking to the Edinburgh Evening News, the Hibernian captain relieved that the club’s refusal to accept they were beaten came from 2-0 behind to seal a 2-2 draw at Tynecastle on that famous cup run. Hibs are currently unbeaten against their arch-rivals in 8 games after a draw at Tynecastle in December extended that run.
“That’s fine, if it keeps going the way it has in the past couple of seasons with the runs we’ve had, then we’ll take that, definitely. Obviously they are difficult games and you have no right to go there and say, ‘we will win’, but it’s one we are all looking forward to and knowing we are capable of doing that.”
“We were well on top and didn’t deserve to be 2-0 down. The manager [Alan Stubbs] told us a goal would change the game, if we got one we’d get two. That’s the way it turned out.
“It was the big turning point. We really believed we would take them back to Easter Road and win. The mentality shifted. We were now favourites and I think the Hearts players believed that as well.
“I believe that game was the catalyst for it all. It changed the mindset and you could see that in the way we played in the replay. We blew Hearts away from the start and there was only going to be one winner. We’ve played really well against them from then on in.”
Hibs are currently in the Algarve and are hoping that their warm weather camp will stop them from being caught cold by Levein’s Hearts.
