Interview: Colin Calderwood, Hibernian FC manager

• Tough times: Colin Calderwood Photograph: Craig Williamson/SNS

NO-ONE other than Colin Calderwood will know if his comments are based simply on hope or some kind of real expectation but he delivers them in a manner which suggests he truly believes them, which should offer him some solace - in the short term at least.

Asked if Hibs could be relegated, the beleaguered manager, who guided his men to only two wins in his first 15 games in charge, didn't duck the issue. "On the current situation, of course we could get relegated. I'm not shying away from that." Neither are others. Already there have been calls for his dismissal, the quickest sacking since Franck Sauzee was at the helm. So far he is clinging on, suggestions that he had already offered to resign dismissed, but if the side were to drop to the First Division, the question of whether he would then expect to lose his job is a valid one. The answer is succinct. "No!"

It's not that he has been gifted such an assurance by club chairman Rod Petrie, though, or requested it. "It's not a question I would ask him because it is probably a line that would raise an eyebrow," said Calderwood, "but I don't think in those terms. I have a longer-term strategy, although that would also mean us staying up."

Promises garnered from any board in such circumstances are rarely worth the energy expended asking the question anyway. Others who preceded Calderwood sought verbal affirmations, only to discover those words were worthless.

With so much to trouble him, the man appointed in October remains remarkably calm and stoical. "You've got to be, there's no use flying off the handle because what you say to players has got to take them forward, not take them back," says Calderwood. "We have got to invigorate them a little bit and give them some freedom for the next few games especially. We will be the crutch to keep them going in the short term. They have an undeniable attitude and enjoy working and they want to prove something and turn the results around and if they can do that then that leads to a better feeling amongst themselves and also alters what people portray them to be."

Defined by results, at the moment Hibs are a team of losers and are being portrayed accordingly. The players are not enjoying that mantle, says midfielder Kevin McBride, one of the many players who are out of contract in the summer who have already been told they should actively look for new clubs. "It's up to the players to make things happen. As a team, we're not taking chances and, as a team, we're not defending well. We're in a dogfight. People say that because we're Hibs we'll not go down, but that's not true. There are other good teams around us and the way we're playing we don't deserve to be anywhere apart from where we are.

"We have to start picking up results. The fans are getting restless and frustrated and rightly so - so are the manager and the players."

There is an incredulity in his assessment that this is a team that earlier this season beat champions Rangers 3-0 at Ibrox but latterly couldn't best Second Division Ayr United in the Scottish Cup.

But his manager is less bemused by it. "The variance in those results against two different-level teams, that's the reality of football." He says that while others looked at that Ibrox result and assumed the club had turned the corner, he wasn't so nave. "No, I think only idiots would think that. What you have to remember is the excellence of [Mark] Brown in goal and the luck we had with the first goal.

"Is it in them to do it on a regular basis? One result isn't consistent but they are capable of that, yes. But football is about that unpredictability. You are talking about consistency and, at the minute, we have that, it's just consistency in losing."

The team which can beat Rangers then lose to Ayr to extend the Cup hoodoo to an embarrassing 110 years also contains some players who were tussling with the Old Firm in the first half of last season and securing a place in Europe as the curtain came down. There is, according to McBride, no rhyme or reason to such a disparity.

Last term's achievements weren't enough to safeguard former manager John Hughes when poor form engulfed Hibs this term. His mistake was shouldering the blame to protect his players, yet Calderwood seems to want to take the same well-worn path.

"I'm the manager so I have got to take responsibility for their actions and make sure they are not scared of playing. We have to keep a togetherness in the dressing room and show a willingness to work and a bit of honesty about how we have done. That's why the discussions we have had with the players have not always been pleasant but they come in and go to work again and although results would suggest there is a problem there, there's not.

"At the minute the players have to be led and that is my job. They have to be managed and coached and that is my job so I have to do that."

But more than three months into his reign, having taken just eight points from a possible 39, the message doesn't seem to be getting through. Calderwood talks about what is necessary to turn things around - "good principles, good organisation, good work-rate and good team spirit" - and what elements are currently missing - "organisation" - but the players can't seem to take whatever is being taught on the training ground onto the pitch. He has brought in midfielder Matt Thornhill from Nottingham Forest and hopes another couple of players will arrive before the end of January to freshen things up, but essentially, until the summer, Calderwood is stuck with what he already has.

"There is no magic wand, just our own determination to get it right," he says. "Organisation has not been consistently done and that has cost us. We want to lessen the mistakes because at the minute they have cost us too many of the opening goals in games. But you have to keep going back because these are the boys we have got at the minute so we have to find a way for them to learn."

The correct approach is proving elusive. No wonder, when asked whether this transfer window is simply about finding a short-term fix to tide him over to the summer, Calderwood offered a wry but telling response.

"There is a little something that will help us between now and the end of the season . . . aspirin . . . and then, in the perfect, perfect world, there will be new people starting next season."

With so many out of contract and already informed they will not be offered new deals, that is a certainty. What league Hibs will be playing in, and who will be managing them, has still to be determined.