Jack Ross last night challenged his Hampden heroes to complete an Old Firm double by dumping Celtic in next month’s Premier Sports Cup final.
The Hibs boss watched on with pride as his players demolished Rangers 3-1 in the semi-final to set up the December 19 shootout with Ange Postecoglou ’s outfit.
And the manner in which his side beat Rangers, thanks to Martin Boyle’s sensational first half hat-trick, has fuelled Ross with belief that Hibs can win their first trophy since the 2016 Scottish Cup.
He said: “You need to keep breaking down barriers and we’ve done that a little bit today.
“We’ve won semi finals before here but to do it against one of the big two means a lot and the players will grow from that.
“We’ve got a lot of league games first and we’ll have to rep[eat that kind of performance.
“But we’ll know we can handle the occasion even though the prize will be bigger. The opposition will be on a par with today.”
The Hibs manager was thrilled with the manner in which his team, who had massive Covid issues last month and hadn’t won since September 26, handled the occasion and thoroughly merited their victory.
And although he is hoping that the SPFL will help them with a fixture pile-up in December - Hibs have five games scheduled next month before facing Celtic in the final - he isn’t holding out high hopes.
“Yeah it would be nice if the SPFL helped us out a little bit in the lead up to the final.
“But I won’t hold my breath in the coming days.
“It’s a showpiece final in Scotland. It should be played between teams who are ready to play.
“If it doesn’t change then we’ll deal with it.
“We’ve had a tough few weeks and there has been criticism before that. We have been asked questions about big games but the truth is we keep coming back to big games.
“Winning the game was the big thing but the performance in all aspects of the game is best described as ‘enjoyable’.”
“The pace of the first half was ridiculous. We have spoken about being very good against Rangers but the results haven’t gone our way and the key moments maybe went against us.
“Today, the first goal was maybe a bit fortuitous in the way it fell to Martin but that’s a big moment because it gives us momentum.
“The second half we had to be resilient, defend properly and put bodies on the line. We worked incredibly hard while not carrying as much of an attacking threat.
“But we were outstanding in terms of wanting to defend our lead.”
And he praised the impact of his hat-trick hero Boyle, adding: “For two years now he’s been great for me. He’s growing and growing and is now a top international player for Australia. He is such a threat and playing in that position against Rangers, he always causes them problems.
“He told me yesterday that Rangers are the only team he hadn’t scored against in his career was Rangers, so he picked the right time although I’m not sure I envisaged he’d score a first half hat-trick but for him it’s just another moment to cherish and look back on. Not many people score cup hat-tricks at Hampden.”
