HIBERNIAN scraped into the top six with a battling draw at McDiarmid Park, as Lewis Stevenson’s well-taken equaliser cancelled out Steve May’s acrobatic early effort for the hosts.
It was referee Craig Napier though who was keen to hog the limelight…
LEE JOHNSON ON LINE ONE
If the SFA’s appeal tribunal thought the spotlight on them might die down a little after a fraught week, they might well have another thing coming.
Hibernian manager Lee Johnson is sure to be on the Hampden hotline straight to Crawford Allan in the morning after watching referee Napier send off Jeggo just after the interval here, for what looked at the time to be a fairly robust - but hardly excessive - slide tackle.
Jeggo took the ball alright, but that hot topic arose again over whether his follow-through had subsequently endangered his opponent, Connor McLennan.
It looked harsh in the extreme, and it was a genuine mystery as to why VAR official Chris Graham didn’t at least ask Napier to take a second look.
Despite the dismissal of Graeme Shinnie’s appeal and the extra game’s suspension he received as a result earlier this week, Hibs will surely risk their deposit on this one.
Napier’s performance took another bizarre twist as he demanded that the visiting physio enter the field of play to tend to Kevin Nisbet after the striker had already recovered from an apparent facial injury, thus forcing him to leave the field of play for a few seconds.
Just another quiet afternoon for one of our whistlers.
NEW ERA STARTS AT SAINTS UNDER STEVEN MACLEAN
It was out with the old and in with the new – well, sort of – as MacLean stepped up into the McDiarmid Park hotseat for the first time since the departure of Callum Davidson.
Before the match, Saints fans unfurled a banner which read ‘You made the impossible dream a reality, thank you Callum’ in recognition of their previous manager’s astonishing feat of delivering a cup double a couple of seasons ago.
Sadly., it all rather turned sour after that, and MacLean now had his chance to make his mark as he bids to land the job on a full-time basis. And they played pretty well.
Ok, they were helped a little by the otherwise excellent David Marshall momentarily developing poppadom wrists as he fumbled May’s dolly of an overhead kick into the net – he may argue he was unsighted due to the presence of Nisbet in front of him - but the home side were well worth their lead at that stage.
They will feel they should have made more of having the extra man though for almost the entirety of the second half.
JEKYLL & HYDE HIBS
It must drive Hibs manager Johnson crazy that not only does he not know which version of his team will appear week-on-week, but often, from minute to minute.
Off the back of their huge derby win over Hearts, he may have expected them to come haring out the traps here, but they were lethargic until Stevenson’s brilliantly taken leveller sparked them into life.
The full-back doesn’t score many – this was his first since netting against Runavik in a European qualifier back in July 2018 – but when he does, they tend to be decent. This was no different, taking a touch on an Elie Youann centre and immediately firing low past Remi Matthews from 18 yards.
The red card hindered them after that, but overall, the huge Hibs support that were stationed in three of the four stands at McDiarmid Park may feel they deserve better from their team.
Thankfully for them, results elsewhere allowed them to stumble into the top six.
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