Ryan Porteous will leave Hibs this summer after the club confirmed he won’t be signing a new contract.
Porteous is an Easter Road academy graduate and shone on his Scotland debut earlier this year. An offer had been on the table from his boyhood club, but the 25-year-old has opted not to put pen to paper and will leave under freedom of contract at the end of the season.
The news comes as a big blow to Hibs fans, who already this week were told that talisman Martin Boyle was out of the season after it was discovered during surgery that he had ruptured his cruciate ligament. Porteous suffered a serious knee injury himself in 2019/20and did his rehab alongside Boyle. Manager Lee Johnson admitted that moving the defender on in january could be the best option for all parties. And he's suggested the English Championship as an ideal destination.
"I’ve got no issue with Ryan at all. He turned down the best contract we could offer and is seeking pastures new.," he said. "I think potentially a January sale would be the best idea if we realise the fee, because at that point you can reinvest the money back into the club. That doesn’t necessarily mean a replacement for Ryan but we do need to put that money back in.
“If I was a Championship manager, and I have been in the past, he is the type of player I would be looking at. I know what wages the clubs pay, and they are high. Add in fact that you have an agent who probably hasn’t had an income source from the likes of Ryan in the past and is seeing an opportunity to help Ryan and get him to where he believes he should be. This is unfortunately the nature of the beast.”
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