‘Hibs are a very special club to me’ - Rob Jones on anniversary of League Cup glory

Ex-captain allowed Scott Brown to lift trophy with him

Rob Jones runs away to celebrate his opening goal in the 2007 Scottish League Cup final. Picture: Ian Rutherford

On March 18, 2007, Rob Jones joined a small but select group of Hibernian captains to have successfully led his side to League Cup glory.

That day he chose to let his young team-mate and academy graduate Scott Brown join him in hoisting the silverware aloft, the moment proving habit-forming for the now treble treble-winning Celtic captain.

The Easter Road club have also gone on to follow up that triumph with a Scottish Cup win. But, 13 years on, the man who secured his place in the club’s history books by scoring the goal that laid the foundations for the triumph is content replaying the highlights of that day in his mind, although, he says, his son, Ethan, prefers the DVD.

Hibs team celebrate their CIS Insurance Cup final success. Picture: Bill Murray/SNS

“He is 13 and was there that day, although he obviously can’t remember it. But, to be fair, I came into the house just a few days ago and he was watching the DVD again. It is something both of my boys have been brought up on. It is part of our family history and a day I will never forget.

“It’s strange but I probably think about it more now that I have retired than I did when I was at the club. That’s just the way footballers are, we just think about the next game and then the next game. You don’t really take time to absorb it all at the time, but I have reflected on it a lot since I stopped playing and I realise how lucky I was to fulfil my boyhood dream of winning a cup final. To lead the team out as captain and then score a goal made it all the more special.”

I was quite emotional

Now a coach at a Leeds-based football academy, as he works towards his pro-licence, the 40-year-old former defender says that cup win, and the squad of players who helped the club to a first trophy win in 16 years, ensured that his affinity with the Leith side endures long after he returned south.

“It is the second result I look for every week, The first is Sheffield Wednesday because I have always been a fan. But Hibs are a very special club to me.

“I remember so many big moments from that day from opening the curtains in the morning and everything was bright white. We were overlooking a golf course and it was covered in snow! Growing up you always think of cup finals as sunny days at the end of the season but the League Cup final was played part way through and we treated it like just another game.

“It was only when we got nearer the stadium that we started to appreciate that it meant so much more. It was two hours before kick-off but you could see the green and white and see on the faces of the fans how much winning meant to them. It was very special.”

It was also increasingly obvious that it was very different from anything he had experienced previously.

“I had never played in a cup final before and I remember walking out on to the pitch and feeling quite emotional, and I don’t usually get emotional.”

We had quality players in that team

But the Englishman topped that surge 28 minutes into the action, when, in the blizzard, he rose at the back post to head home David Murphy’s corner and set the team on the road to what would ultimately prove a convincing 5-1 triumph over Kilmarnock, with Abdessalam Benjelloun and Steven Fletcher grabbing a brace each, while the Rugby Park side’s only effort came from Gordon Greer.

“There is a picture of that goal on my son’s bedroom wall, so I am reminded of it every day. We had quality players in that team and, if I’m honest, it was the only game in my whole career where I didn’t feel nervous. Usually, I like a bit of nerves but for some reason that day, I didn’t have any and, although Kilmarnock started quite well, it was quite comfortable in the end.”

The mid-season staging meant that manager John Collins had them back at work two days later, but not before a highlights reel of moments had been consigned to the memory bank, ready for him to play back at his leisure after he hung up his boots. Those recollections come with a soundtrack.

Sunshine on Leith

“Sunshine on Leith is a song that will forever be ingrained in my memory. I still get goosebumps when I hear it or someone talks about it. At the end, we all stood on the pitch with arms linked in front of the supporters as they were singing it and it was emotional for the boss and the players, too.

“Every time I hear the song, it takes me back to that moment. Although, to be fair, it was probably sung another 20 or 30 times that night!”

And probably well into the next morning before the celebrations were wrapped up, having basked in the response from the fans and an open-top bus parade through the streets of Leith, which only 
reinforced the connection between players and fans.

“I think that was when we realised how many lives, how many families, you actually touch as a player. It was very humbling seeing people cheering us with tears in their eyes.

“You could see how much it meant. It is a special club – I would probably go as far as calling it home, that’s how much it means to me – and the fact that cup win meant I had joined a small group of Hibs captains who have won a trophy there, is something no-one can ever take away from me.”