‘It’s not good enough,’ says Francomb after Hibs’ latest collapse

HIBERNIAN thought they could see the light at the end of the tunnel after their back-to-back wins in Fife earlier this month, but it has since been shown up as a false dawn.

Their old familiar failings led to defeat at home to St Johnstone nine days ago, and on Saturday those same flaws were again on display as they lost 4-0 at Ibrox.

In one sense, Pat Fenlon could write off this result as unimportant: when you are struggling at the bottom of the league, the games against the teams around you are the crucial ones, and anything you gain from the clubs at the top is a bonus. But in another respect, the Hibs manager cannot afford to ignore this one, as it constitutes further evidence of his squad’s inability to gel as a team and achieve any consistency of performance.

Ivan Sproule deserved pass marks, as did George Francomb and a couple of others, and Sam Stanton, probably the most gifted member of the current under-19 team, came on in the last five minutes to make his debut. Otherwise, there was nothing positive for Hibs about the game, which leaves them just a point ahead of Dunfermline at the bottom of the table.

“It is massively disappointing, particularly in the manner we conceded all four goals,” Francomb accepted. “It is not good enough. I thought we gave a good account of ourselves in the first half. We had a couple of good chances, but we can’t defend like that and expect to win games, especially at places like this.”

When he joined on loan from Norwich City earlier this month, Francomb was aware he was moving to an under-performing team who were badly short of confidence.

But when his debut was that 3-2 win at Dunfermline, he thought, like most other people at Easter Road, that the rot had been halted.

“I knew it was going to be very tough, but when we got the 3-2 win at Dunfermline I thought that we were turning the corner and were going to get up the table. It didn’t happen for us at home against St Johnstone last week – soft goals again. And it has happened here today again.

“You can’t ignore the situtation that we are in. The effort is there and everyone is putting in 100 per cent, but the goals we are letting in show a lack of confidence and it is not good enough.

“I’ve only been here a few games, but the lads have said that there has been a lot of that this season, and we have to cut these errors out or it is going to be a tough end to the season.”