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Hold on to your
passport
Players determined its not all
over quite yet -
JOHN CAMPBELL
NOW THAT THEY'VE
RETURNED SAFELY from what turned out to be something of a cauldron of
hate, the players at Easter Road are anxious to assure the fans that
as far as they are concerned progression into the next round is not
beyond them. Meanwhile, for the 500 or so fans who made the trip
there were a few horror tales to tell with coins raining down on them
and heavy duty police and army personnel surrounding them when they
got off their buses at the ground.
Inside he stadium the
AEK fans had started to arrive a full two hours before kick off and to
launch into a series of very loud and quite intimidating songs aimed
at unsettling both visiting players and fans. That's fair enough
but disgracefully, they booed their way through the minute's silence
which was to be observed in memory of those who perished in the
terrorist attacks on America last week. No matter their
political views on the USA, to behave in such an abominable manner
when respect should have been shown for all the innocent people who
perished in that tragedy was shameful.
On the park, however,
the players showed scant regard for such intimidation by just getting
on with the job in hand. A great first half performance had the
home fans quiet for long spells and the little band of Hibbies managed
to outsing them on occasion. The second half was, however, a
different story and it was only ten minutes old when AEK got a penalty
following a Laursen tackle on Georgeas. The big Dane seemed aware that
he'd been outfoxed by the Greek full back and explained later:
"We were under a lot of pressure and although I saw the
guy coming I tried not to put in a full tackle. I didn't really feel
any contact but he went down and the Referee gave a penalty. It was
disappointing. We know its not over yet though and when we get them
back to Easter Road we'll give them a game. If we believe in ourselves
anything is possible."
Clearly it was a
learning experience for all the players and amongst many who performed
well on the night were youngsters Ian Murray and Tam McManus.
Young Murray had a super game and worked tirelessly up and down the
left flank whilst McManus ran his legs of and was eventually
substituted by Paco Luna.
Speaking exclusively to
Hibs.net, Tam explained: "I thought we were very unlucky to get
beat 2 - 0 after a superb first half performance. When they came
at us in the first fifteen minutes of the second half we could feel
the pressure building but we were holding our own.
Unfortunately, the penalty came at a bad time for us as we seemed to
be holding our own and then the second coming so soon after took the
wind out of our sails a bit. But we played well tonight and I
think we can hold our heads up after that performance as we worked
very hard in difficult conditions.
Lets hope for celebrations in the return game with AEK (sns)
Next week we'll be going for a 3-0 victory, nothing less. I've heard they
don't travel well and so if we get them to a packed Easter Road
and maybe its a wee bit windy and rainy they wont like that. If
we get an early goal we'll unsettle them although we know that if they
score it would make qualification very difficult. All the lads
are confident though, we all know what we've got to do and we all
still think we can do it"
Last word goes to
John O'Neil who put in another first class shift in Athens.
"I'd love for us to beat the Greeks and go through and
in all honesty I think we can do it"
At least when their
little band of fans, thought to be going to number 500 or so, arrive
at Easter Road they will not be subjected to the fear and hatred many
of our own fans were over there. Also, if they happened to feel
intimidated in any way they could be sure that our law enforcers will
not resort to shouting at them whilst waving a rio baton and wearing a
visor. Some fans were, I know, stranded at the stadium after the
game because they'd made their own way there but there was no public
transport to get them back to the centre of Athens. Upon trying
to explain their plight to police officers they were met with shrugs
of the shoulder and basically left to get on with it, even though the
hostility of many of the Greek fans was obvious for all but a blind
man to see.
Lets hope they all get
home safely and that they need their passports again for the next
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