Hibs star Riordan hopes new boss can find ideal mix to reach goal

The Easter Road side unveiled their new manager on Monday evening and the former Spurs defender wasted no time in insisting that he can make Hibs a real force to be reckoned with in the top half of the table.

While keen to keep a passing game at the centre of Hibs' play, Calderwood is not afraid of sacrificing that side of the game, as long as it brings his side the right results.

And that is something that Riordan couldn't agree more with. The striker admitted that he was delighted as Hibs picked up their first three points on their home patch in over seven months against Kilmarnock on Saturday despite, by his own admission, the side not playing at the top of their game.

Right now results are the main thing on his mind, with Calderwood and the Hibs players all determined to haul their side back up the SPL table, and Riordan believes that going from back to front more quickly could even increase the number of chances that fall the Hibs strikers' way.

Riordan, who netted 16 goals for Hibs last season, said: "Football is a funny game, we have obviously had a bit of a tough time lately with our results, but we managed to get the win over Kilmarnock last weekend.

"Hopefully that will give us a bit of confidence going into the next four or five games.

When you look at who we have got coming up, it was always going to be hard, no matter how we had been playing.We have tried to play football since the start of the season, and while that is good to watch, we've maybe not been creating enough chances and I think that we've maybe been a bit too slow going forward.

"If the new manager comes in and changes it around, maybe makes us that bit more direct, then I think that might be a good thing for the strikers and the attacking players.

"Getting the ball forward quicker would help us to get forward and create more chances, I think - it should be good for us."Hoggy got two goals on Saturday and the second one came from a kick straight up the park - I think he was further up the park than me! It just shows you, it doesn't matter how sexy the football is, just as long as you get the right results."

Former Newcastle number two Calderwood met his new squad for the first time yesterday morning before their training session at East Mains and Riordan admitted that everyone had been out to make a good first impression on their boss.

The Hibs side travel to Pittodrie this weekend in the SPL and everyone is desperate to stake their claim for a place in the starting line-up against the Dons.

Riordan continued: "The manager came in to meet us yesterday morning, we had a bit of a meeting to get to know one another and then went out to train. Everyone enjoyed it, everyone was flying into tackles in training trying to impress - that always happens when a new manager comes in.

"I think that everyone feels fresh because there is someone new in charge. All of the boys will feel that they deserve a chance to be playing in the team and we all want to show that to the manager.

"We will have to wait and see what the manager does, whether he will name the side on Friday or if we will have to wait a bit longer. Everything is still new to us so no-one knows how it will work just yet.

"If you're in there then you've got to take your chance if it comes along. After the win on Saturday there's a bit of a buzz about the place anyway and hopefully it will have been good for the team's confidence going into the game against Aberdeen on Saturday."

Calderwood brought with him some new training methods, something that the Hibs squad took to immediately, having also seen their schedule given a shake-up by caretaker managers Alistair Stevenson and Gareth Evans.

"Gareth and Alistair Stevenson took us over the weekend and their training has been brilliant, to be honest. I know that we maybe didn't play to our best against Kilmarnock last weekend but the result was the most important thing.

"With the new gaffer coming in it will hopefully give us an extra boost on top of that.

"It's obviously been a bit different, not having a manager, but as players it doesn't really affect you. You just get on with it. The training changed a bit when Gareth and Alistair took over and I think that everyone really enjoyed it because there was a bit of everything really.

"It was a good laugh, it was serious, there were things in there that we hadn't done for a while and the attackers all enjoyed it because we worked on that side of things quite a bit.

"We felt fresh for Saturday and I think that helped." Riordan was speaking at the official launch of 'The Hibernians', a new scheme to replace the Hibernian Youth Benefit Scheme (HYBS) which had been running for 20 years.

The Hibernians has formed a supporter-member lead committee, consisting of three existing scheme members and Hibs officials to help raise funds for the development of young stars of the future at the club.

Rod Cranston, Liz Linn and Mary Allan have been supporting youth development at Hibs since the original Club 86 was launched and they want other supporters to back the new scheme.

Said Cranston: "It's all about investing in the future of the club. Football has changed massively, and the only way that we can keep up with that is to look at initiatives like these.

"We have brought through a lot of good players in the past - Scott Brown, Steven Whittaker, Kenny Miller and Kevin Thomson to name a few - and that just shows how important it is that we support the youth development at the club.

"I think that people would be very surprised if they knew just how much it cost to run the academy so anything that the fans can contribute is a huge help and makes you feel like you're really part of the club."

For a fee of 10 a month, members will benefit from priority ticket purchasing, quarterly academy newsletters, access to the academy on open days and, most importantly, a chance to contribute meaningfully to the future of the club.