Stephens satisfied with Hibs' clean sheet up in Highlands

Published on Monday 1 August 2011 12:49

At one end there were scenes of wild celebration, at the other a few quiet smiles of satisfaction. Together, they had finally brought an end to what had been dubbed Hibs' Highland Hoodoo, nine matches without a win in Inverness, a run which stretched back over six miserable years.

Given such a dismal record, it was little wonder that Garry O'Connor's last-gasp strike at the Tulloch Caledonian Stadium provoked bedlam among the Hibs supporters behind Ryan Esson's goal.

But while O'Connor rightly grabbed the headlines following what was his first goal since his shock return to the Capital, Hibs' historic win was also due, in no small part, to the clean sheet recorded by goalkeeper Graham Stack and the four in front of him, Victor Palsson, David Stephens, Paul Hanlon and Callum Booth.

The upshot was a journey home on a coach buzzing with delight in stark contrast to the seemingly never-ending trips back down the A9 on those previous occasions.

True, as Stephens admitted, Hibs had ridden their luck at times, particularly the heart-stopping moment when Greg Tansey looked certain to grab a last-minute winner when the ball fell to the Caley midfielder just three yards out, only for him to smack it off Stack's left-hand post.

Colin Calderwood's side made the most of that let-off by scoring only a few seconds later, leaving Caley stunned and Hibs elated.

Stephens said: "It would have been a horrible way to lose, my heart was in my mouth at that moment but you have to ride your luck in matches. We could easily have been coming back down the road very unhappy but we went up the other end, scored and had a good trip home.

"We'd never won there before and while luck was a big part of it, we'd also worked very hard all over the pitch. People had labelled it as our hoodoo and when that gets in your head you can often be beaten before you play so to get that monkey off our back was massive for us. Hopefully next time we go up there we can carry on and come back with another win."

If Calderwood declared Hibs had "won a watch" given Caley's dominance in the second half, 6ft 4in Welsh under-21 star Stephens, who started the match as new signing Sean O'Hanlon missed out with a broken toe, insisted that for all their superiority during that period, Terry Butcher's players had forced only one save of note from Stack.

He said: "They had a couple of efforts disallowed as they were blatantly offside because we held a good line and they had that one right at the end which was down to a lack of concentration but it wasn't as if they undid as at any stage with a touch of magic.

"The fact their goalkeeper was named man-of-the-match tells it's own story. He had a couple of good saves from Garry, one he knew nothing about when the ball hit him in the face, and another great fingertip stop of Matt Thornhill. But we dug in, never gave up and it paid off."

Stephens accepted, as Calderwood had said, that it was far from a straightforward victory for Hibs but while happy to see O'Connor grab the limelight, he admitted he and his fellow defenders, boasting an average age of 20, were equally happy to have ensured Caley struck a blank for the second weekend in succession.

It was Hibs' first shutout since Akpo Sodje's goal was enough to see off Aberdeen at Pittodrie at the beginning of April, some seven SPL matches previously when, coincidentally, the back four's average age that day was again only 20, the only change from that team being Palsson at right back in place of Richie Towell, who was then on loan from Celtic.

Stephens, who himself only turned 20 at the start of last month, said: "The gaffer has always said if you are good enough you are old enough and that proved to be the case.

"Having Stacky behind us is a massive bonus. He's experienced and talks away to you while you know that anything that goes in behind he'll be there to collect. Paul alongside me talks, he talks a lot, and that also helps.

"I was reasonably happy with my own performance but as a team we defended well from the front. As a defender a clean sheet is what you want from every game. If we don't lose a goal we don't lose the game.

"I think we'd have been happy with a point away from home, particularly at Inverness given our record, going into those final few minutes. The gaffer had said it was important we left with something and thankfully it was all three points."

"A lot of people had been quick to criticise us after we lost to Celtic. One of their goals was a cracker, the other could have been avoided but we felt there were a number of positives which we could take from the game which had been overlooked and I think we did so."

One charge laid against Calderwood's players on that occasion was the fact they didn't manage one shot on Celtic's goal throughout the entire 90 minutes, a fault which was rectified against Caley even if, for the time being, O'Connor remains Hibs' only fit striker.

Stephens, however, sees plenty to come up front in the weeks to come as Sodje, scorer of six goals in 13 starts following his January move from Charlton Athletic, and Ghana striker Junior Agogo recover from injury.

He said: "I was delighted for Garry, he's been working really hard in training. He's getting his sharpness back and hopefully that's him now up-and-running.

"We've been a bit short of strikers so far with Garry having to lead the line himself with Ivan Sproule playing off him. But once Akpo and Junior are available we are going to have a very strong frontline, guys who can cause any team problems."