geordie_hibs
27-05-2014, 12:34 PM
On April 25th 1993, Kevin Keegan’s first full season as Newcastle United manager was drawing to an end. His fabulously attacking, open side were closing in on the First Division title and a well-deserved promotion to the Premier League. The Magpies’ opponents on that soaking wet Sunday lunchtime were local rivals sunderland; if the game had been played in conditions conducive to proper football, it seems likely the home side would have won by a cricket score. As it was, the points stayed on Tyneside after a single goal victory, courtesy of an early free kick by Scott Sellars, who bent the ball round the wall and in off the post at the Leazes end in front of the demoralised and drenched away support. Perhaps the only noticeable thing about the visiting side’s sluggish, insipid performance that day was that most of the players appeared to have been suffering from ringworm, which was the most plausible explanation for the fact that almost all of them had had their heads shaved in the lead up to the game. Risibly, the truth was actually that this trichological aberration had been at the instigation of then sunderland manager Terry Butcher, who had sequestered his team away the night before at Otterburn Army Barracks in the wilds of the Northumberland National Park the night before, in an attempt to instil the idea that they were commandoes on a dawn raid into the minds of his squad. This risible attempt at cod psychology was so successful that sunderland had one shot on target all game and continued to flirt precariously with relegation for the rest of the campaign, avoiding the drop on the final day by a single point. Butcher, whose pitiful version of tactics appeared to consist of crass populist post-match cheering and singsongs in front of the away fans, a la Paolo Di Canio, rather than any significant tactical intervention, was relieved of his duties in November 1993 after a 3-1 home loss to Southend saw the Wearsiders fall to the foot of the table.
On May 24th 2009, much to the vicarious glee of a reported 83% of football fans, Newcastle United were relegated from the Premier League after a spineless, woeful 1-0 loss away to Aston Villa. After a season marked by unnecessary managerial change and atrocious decisions in the boardroom, complacency and cowardice on the pitch and a riven support that veered between rabid anger with the owners and mute disgust at the decline of the club, this final day performance summed up everything that had gone wrong in the whole season. All that was needed was one goal, but lethargic underachievers unwilling to bother their ***** played alongside timid plodders who had no reason to be in the first time, while an impotent management team seemed utterly unable to change anything or inspire the one last push required and the top flight status won with such a flourish by Keegan’s charges 16 years previous, was senselessly squandered. The result was a deserved relegation for a team that ought, if the season had been properly managed, to have finished in the top half of the table.
On May 25th 2014, Hibernian concluded the Scottish season in traditional fashion, by being ritually humiliated in the final game of the domestic senior campaign, losing the second leg of the SPL promotion / relegation play-off 2-0 to Hamilton Academicals. This made the score 2-2 on aggregate and Hibs went on to complete this sporting self-immolation by losing 4-3 on penalties. As a Newcastle and Hibs fan, this felt far worse than NUFC’s demotion in 2009, even if it was as equally unnecessary and completely preventable, because unlike the Villa Park fiasco, I was actually present to see this limp disintegration with my own eyes. It was hideous from start to finish. Unspeakably so. Sadness and anger still exist in equal measures and I feel far, far worse than I did 5 years ago.
Of course, with Hibs having opened the 2013/2014 home campaign with an iconic 7-0 loss to Malmo in the Europa League qualifiers, dire embarrassing routs at Easter Road are nothing new under the sun. In 2012, this ritual end of season pummelling was courtesy of a 5-1 defeat to Hearts in the Cup final. In 2013, a 3-0 loss to Celtic involved another fruitless trip to Hampden. Presumably, in Terry Butcher’s world, losing 2-0 at home to Hamilton Academicals in the SPL promotion and relegation play-off is a tangible form of progress and a solid base on which to build, as the net number of goals involved in the defeat is diminishing by one each year. Consequently, next season there will undoubtedly be a single goal loss in the same promotion or relegation play-off to endure, providing Hibs can manage to avoid defeats to the likes of Alloa, Cowdenbeath and Dumbarton, never mind the supposed giants in the league, in the shape of Rangers and Hearts and very handy outfits such as Raith Rovers, who won at Easter Road in the Cup in the season just ending of course and Falkirk. For completeness, the division will also include Livingston and Queen of the South. Fir Park no more! Pittodrie no more! Tannadice no more! Parkhead no more!
Let’s be brutally honest about this; relegation, which had only been avoided in the first place because of the points deduction endured by Hearts, is the only appropriate eventuality for any team that loses 2-0 at home to a side from the division below, days after seemingly doing the hard work by beating said lower league side away from home by the same score. The eventual defeat on penalties was almost incidental; long before Kevin Thomson and Jason Cummings, the former being his final touch of the ball as a Hibernian player, had their spot kicks saved, the script had been written. Unlike the glorious evening at Broadwood in 1997 that marked Darren Jackson’s last game as a Hibee, when Hibs came back from the dead to see off Airdrie, only to predictably go down without a whimper the following season, there was to be no get out of jail card.
Ignoring the statistics, the actual pattern of the Hamilton Academicals home game saw the away side deservedly win the prize of a place in the top flight. From the minute Danny Haynes limped off after 8 minutes, the timid performance of the team and dreadful tactics of Butcher played into the visitors’ hands. Jason Scotland is almost 36; however the Hibs defence appeared to believe he was South Lanarkshire’s answer to Lionel Messi. Ryan McGivern didn’t kick the ball straight all day, so giving the ball away to the Accies striker for the opening goal was a predictable error that set the tone for a woeful 120 minutes. Williams ought to have saved the shot, but predictably he didn’t and it squirmed in with barely 12 minutes on the clock. The only hope was abandonment as the incessant downpours left puddles on the pitch. Sadly, even the weather deserted us and by the time Hamilton prevailed, the glorious sunshine that beat down on Leith hinted at pathetic play rather than pathetic fallacy.
From the point Scotland scored onwards, with the near sell-out crowd containing an appreciable number of fair-weather fans who appeared to have turned up expecting to be entertained and ready to complain at the slightest error, the game became as tense and unpleasant as any game I can recall. Hibs offered nothing and Hamilton always seemed to be able to snatch another goal, at least until Kevin Thomson appeared after 68 minutes. Suddenly, with the appearance of someone who could actually pass the ball with a degree of accuracy and a modicum of vision, it looked as if Hibs could actually grab an equaliser. Sadly Butcher, whose cartoon histrionics on the bench failed to hide the presence of a tactical incompetent and frightened paper tiger in the manager’s role, decided to play it safe by taking off Heffernan for Tudur-Jones. Here we were, playing 4-5-1 at home, trying to defend a 1-0 loss to Hamilton Academicals. Predictably, drawing the opposition on drew one last Hail Mary and, with 40 seconds of injury time left, they made it 2-0. That was it; the phoney war of extra time, whereby Williams spent 30 minutes aimlessly launching high balls while the tallest player on the pitch (Tudur-Jones) stood nowhere near the general direction of centre forward, and the penalties were an unnecessary codicil. The steady stream of deserters from the stand and the mute acceptance of our fate at full time, certainly where I was sat in the West Upper, showed that the fans knew the game was up long before the end.
I lost count of the number of conversations I heard on the way out that included variations on the phrase “this has been coming for 3 years now.” This isn’t being wise after the event; it’s an understanding of the fatal culture of incompetence and mismanagement that has been prevalent in boardroom and dug-out at Easter Road for too long now. Sadly I wish I had the confidence to state that things are going to change, but I don’t. I have no belief that this relegation will prove to be the cleansing experience it was for Newcastle in 2009/2010. I simply can’t see the current incumbents rebuilding the squad to provide a realistic promotion challenge next year, despite the positive outcomes of the last 2 demotions and attendant immediate returns to the top flight.
On May 24th 2009, much to the vicarious glee of a reported 83% of football fans, Newcastle United were relegated from the Premier League after a spineless, woeful 1-0 loss away to Aston Villa. After a season marked by unnecessary managerial change and atrocious decisions in the boardroom, complacency and cowardice on the pitch and a riven support that veered between rabid anger with the owners and mute disgust at the decline of the club, this final day performance summed up everything that had gone wrong in the whole season. All that was needed was one goal, but lethargic underachievers unwilling to bother their ***** played alongside timid plodders who had no reason to be in the first time, while an impotent management team seemed utterly unable to change anything or inspire the one last push required and the top flight status won with such a flourish by Keegan’s charges 16 years previous, was senselessly squandered. The result was a deserved relegation for a team that ought, if the season had been properly managed, to have finished in the top half of the table.
On May 25th 2014, Hibernian concluded the Scottish season in traditional fashion, by being ritually humiliated in the final game of the domestic senior campaign, losing the second leg of the SPL promotion / relegation play-off 2-0 to Hamilton Academicals. This made the score 2-2 on aggregate and Hibs went on to complete this sporting self-immolation by losing 4-3 on penalties. As a Newcastle and Hibs fan, this felt far worse than NUFC’s demotion in 2009, even if it was as equally unnecessary and completely preventable, because unlike the Villa Park fiasco, I was actually present to see this limp disintegration with my own eyes. It was hideous from start to finish. Unspeakably so. Sadness and anger still exist in equal measures and I feel far, far worse than I did 5 years ago.
Of course, with Hibs having opened the 2013/2014 home campaign with an iconic 7-0 loss to Malmo in the Europa League qualifiers, dire embarrassing routs at Easter Road are nothing new under the sun. In 2012, this ritual end of season pummelling was courtesy of a 5-1 defeat to Hearts in the Cup final. In 2013, a 3-0 loss to Celtic involved another fruitless trip to Hampden. Presumably, in Terry Butcher’s world, losing 2-0 at home to Hamilton Academicals in the SPL promotion and relegation play-off is a tangible form of progress and a solid base on which to build, as the net number of goals involved in the defeat is diminishing by one each year. Consequently, next season there will undoubtedly be a single goal loss in the same promotion or relegation play-off to endure, providing Hibs can manage to avoid defeats to the likes of Alloa, Cowdenbeath and Dumbarton, never mind the supposed giants in the league, in the shape of Rangers and Hearts and very handy outfits such as Raith Rovers, who won at Easter Road in the Cup in the season just ending of course and Falkirk. For completeness, the division will also include Livingston and Queen of the South. Fir Park no more! Pittodrie no more! Tannadice no more! Parkhead no more!
Let’s be brutally honest about this; relegation, which had only been avoided in the first place because of the points deduction endured by Hearts, is the only appropriate eventuality for any team that loses 2-0 at home to a side from the division below, days after seemingly doing the hard work by beating said lower league side away from home by the same score. The eventual defeat on penalties was almost incidental; long before Kevin Thomson and Jason Cummings, the former being his final touch of the ball as a Hibernian player, had their spot kicks saved, the script had been written. Unlike the glorious evening at Broadwood in 1997 that marked Darren Jackson’s last game as a Hibee, when Hibs came back from the dead to see off Airdrie, only to predictably go down without a whimper the following season, there was to be no get out of jail card.
Ignoring the statistics, the actual pattern of the Hamilton Academicals home game saw the away side deservedly win the prize of a place in the top flight. From the minute Danny Haynes limped off after 8 minutes, the timid performance of the team and dreadful tactics of Butcher played into the visitors’ hands. Jason Scotland is almost 36; however the Hibs defence appeared to believe he was South Lanarkshire’s answer to Lionel Messi. Ryan McGivern didn’t kick the ball straight all day, so giving the ball away to the Accies striker for the opening goal was a predictable error that set the tone for a woeful 120 minutes. Williams ought to have saved the shot, but predictably he didn’t and it squirmed in with barely 12 minutes on the clock. The only hope was abandonment as the incessant downpours left puddles on the pitch. Sadly, even the weather deserted us and by the time Hamilton prevailed, the glorious sunshine that beat down on Leith hinted at pathetic play rather than pathetic fallacy.
From the point Scotland scored onwards, with the near sell-out crowd containing an appreciable number of fair-weather fans who appeared to have turned up expecting to be entertained and ready to complain at the slightest error, the game became as tense and unpleasant as any game I can recall. Hibs offered nothing and Hamilton always seemed to be able to snatch another goal, at least until Kevin Thomson appeared after 68 minutes. Suddenly, with the appearance of someone who could actually pass the ball with a degree of accuracy and a modicum of vision, it looked as if Hibs could actually grab an equaliser. Sadly Butcher, whose cartoon histrionics on the bench failed to hide the presence of a tactical incompetent and frightened paper tiger in the manager’s role, decided to play it safe by taking off Heffernan for Tudur-Jones. Here we were, playing 4-5-1 at home, trying to defend a 1-0 loss to Hamilton Academicals. Predictably, drawing the opposition on drew one last Hail Mary and, with 40 seconds of injury time left, they made it 2-0. That was it; the phoney war of extra time, whereby Williams spent 30 minutes aimlessly launching high balls while the tallest player on the pitch (Tudur-Jones) stood nowhere near the general direction of centre forward, and the penalties were an unnecessary codicil. The steady stream of deserters from the stand and the mute acceptance of our fate at full time, certainly where I was sat in the West Upper, showed that the fans knew the game was up long before the end.
I lost count of the number of conversations I heard on the way out that included variations on the phrase “this has been coming for 3 years now.” This isn’t being wise after the event; it’s an understanding of the fatal culture of incompetence and mismanagement that has been prevalent in boardroom and dug-out at Easter Road for too long now. Sadly I wish I had the confidence to state that things are going to change, but I don’t. I have no belief that this relegation will prove to be the cleansing experience it was for Newcastle in 2009/2010. I simply can’t see the current incumbents rebuilding the squad to provide a realistic promotion challenge next year, despite the positive outcomes of the last 2 demotions and attendant immediate returns to the top flight.