Gray: We Need To Start With Energy
David Gray wants to see a fast start from his players on Saturday as they face Motherwell in the William Hill Premiership.
Gray’s side have had six days to prepare for this fixture after a gruelling Christmas/New Year period, but the games have continued to fall for the Well as they drew with Kilmarnock in midweek.
When speaking to Hibs TV, our Head Coach stressed the importance of getting off to a good start.
“It’ll be a really difficult game. We need to use the advantage that we haven’t played in the week, and they have, so we need to start with a real energy and appetite.
“We’re just short of a full training week because the Rangers game was on Sunday, but we’ve benefitted from having an extra couple of days on the grass.
“We’ve been able to get around the boys again, and the boys that haven’t had many minutes have been able to train properly as well. When you’re preparing for games, and haven’t played many minutes, you can decondition at times, so you need to guard against that. We’ve had a good week this week and the full focus is on Motherwell.
“They’re above us in the league at this time for a reason, so we are expecting a tough game.
“The players will be ready for this challenge, it’s the third time we’ve played them this season and when you enter this stage of the season everyone knows all about each other. There are certain tweaks you’d make from previous games, but we need to focus on how we want to play the game and to start the game as well as we can.
“We want to build on this momentum and positivity.”
Over the last couple of weeks David Gray was named the SPFL Manager of the Month, whilst Nicky Cadden won the Player of the Month award, and our Head Coach was quick to heap praise on his players and staff after the pair received their recognition.
“Full credit and congratulations to Nicky; it’s fully deserved for how well he’s done. He’s affected games in a really positive way. He took his opportunity in the team after a slow start to his Hibs career because of injuries and missing pre-season, we had to build him up. He’s benefitting from that, and we certainly are.
“The manager of the month award comes from a real collective performance, you see that from everyone involved, and it shows how far we’ve come; that’s full credit to the players and the staff for all pulling in the same direction and having the inner belief that we’d turn it around. This is not the end of the road.
“We need to keep progressed and pushing. When you look at the league right now, we’re one point from sixth, but three from 11th. We’re not looking down the way at all, but we also need to guard against complacency.
“I constantly tell the players we need to keep pushing and moving forward.”