'Bad decision': Lee Johnson admit to one Hibs regret as he looks back on year in charge

Looking back on his first year as Hibs manager, Lee Johnson says that if there is one thing he regrets, it is the early exit in the Viaplay Cup and the part he played in it.

Lee Johnson looks back with regret at Hibs' exit from the Viaplay Cup.

But he insists that he, the club and the players have come a long way since those group defeats to Falkirk and Morton and while there is still European football to play for in the final three matches of the 2022/23 season, he has already set lofty targets for next term.

“This is a good, historic club that should be competing on European nights more often than they have been over the last ten years,” said Johnson ahead of Sunday’s Premiership match against Rangers. “Group stages are important because of the finances that brings. I’d really like to get into the European group stages and have an impact on that next season. Looking back now, I think maybe the club knew they wanted me a little bit earlier than they gave me the job. Maybe I could have been in the door a couple of weeks earlier and maybe that could have set us up better.”

It would have given him more time to get to grips with the squad and the early start to competitive action. “The cups were disappointing this season,” Johnson admitted. “You always feel for Hibs you have a chance in the cups, you win a couple of games and you are in the semis. Do I think I got that wrong? I could go back to my team selection in that first half at Falkirk … bad decision. I probably tried to treat it like a pre-season game and give everyone a shot and we were 1-0 down at half-time.

“I changed the team, we pummelled them in the second half, but that was probably the reason we didn’t get through in the Viaplay. Would that have been different had I started earlier? Well you know a bit more about the individuals, don’t you? As it was, those were trial games, in my mind because don’t forget how early the season started. That bamboozled me, to be honest. If that was an opportunity for silverware, we should have been in for a month before that, minimum.

“That was a lesson for me, and that’s probably the biggest lesson in that year so far. Then we had a difficult game against Hearts [in the Scottish Cup] and we always want to beat our local rivals in a game at Easter Road, so, probably, my regrets are the cups in terms of me getting that first one wrong and not winning the game against Hearts.”

But, with games against Rangers, Celtic and Hearts, they can still finish the season on a high, possibly even overtaking the Gorgie side. “To be in the fight for Europe is what we want,” said wing-back Chris Cadden, who was injured the last time the team tackled UEFA qualifiers. “A club like Hibs should be in the fight for Europe at the end of every season. You should have big games and be fighting for third or fourth. I’ve never played European football yet. So of course it’s an obvious ambition. To see Hearts do it this season really whets the appetite. It makes you think ‘I want some of that, I want to play Fiorentina or whoever’.”