Hibs boss addresses Celtic Cup challenge and shock off-field losses with 'demands' claim
Will £7 million figure impact on need to achieve on-field success?
David Gray has addressed his team’s Scottish Cup chances after being handed an away draw against Celtic in the quarter-finals. And he’s insisted that the £7.1 million losses posted by the club have NOT increased pressure on him to lift silverware and climb the Scottish Premiership table.
Gray, in his first season as manager, understands that success on the field helps balance the book at a club where the wages to turnover ratio leapt to an unsustainable 81 per cent in the most recent accounts. But he’s comfortable with assurances that the Gordon family will continue covering losses to deliver on the vision of late chairman Ron Gordon.
The former Scottish Cup winner, who captained Hibs to their hoodoo-busting 2016 triumph at Hampden, knows his team have been handed the draw no-one wanted in the last eight of this year’s competition. But it’s made no difference, he insists, to the over-arching ambition of a club who should be chasing at least one trophy every season.
Gray said: “Well, I think on paper it's certainly as tough as it gets, isn't it? I think though, that's another objective at the start of the season, I've said it many times now, is can you win a cup?
“It's a definite opportunity to try and do that and try and finish as high as you can in the league, obviously the top end of the league. And for Hibs to win the cup, somebody's going to have to beat Celtic, so why can't it not be us? It's going to have to be us now.”
Asked if the scale of the club’s losses emphasised the need to achieve on-field success, Gray insisted: “I think, as I've said many times, regardless of the number, profit, loss, whatever the number is that the club produces from a financial side and that number that goes out there, the objectives of this football club are always the same. So we always need to be finishing in that top six minimum with a chance of trying to finish in Europe.
“That's always been my objective at this football club as a player, with every manager I've worked with as a coach - and now that I'm the head coach, that's the message to the players. When you play for a club like this with the expectation, the demands, just everything that goes with it, that you need to be competing at the top end of this league, and we know that.
“That doesn't change regardless of what numbers you produce from a financial point of view, and I think that your rewards come from being more successful, of course.”
Fan concerns
Asked if he could understand fans getting worried by the headline figures, Gray said: “A hundred percent. You wouldn't like to see the number coming out and everyone panicking about it but at the same time, as I've already said, all I can talk about is the experience I've had with it which is the support I've had throughout the whole way. The number's there.
“The Gordon family have been incredibly supportive of me - but not just me. I think back to all the managers previously since they joined the football club and where the club is now to where it has been. The amount of investment in it from that point of view has been incredible. It's in a far better place in terms of off the pitch.
“You start to think about the investment in the stadium, the improvements there, the training ground which is still continuing to be developed all the time. They want to take the club forward.
“The ambitions, the majority of it was all Ron's vision when he came to the club and where he wanted to take it to. The stadium now is at that level - and my job is to try and make sure I bring the playing side up to where it needs to be.
“The more successful we can be on the pitch definitely helps for that side of the game. Even, I think back to speaking about after we beat Ayr United, the importance of getting into the quarter-finals of the Cup and what we do in terms of future planning, that was important. So from that point of view, that's great.
“One thing I would say is the number we've put out there is one that the Gordon family have fully supported. And I think I can only talk about the support I've had.
“The number of players that are going to be out of contract this summer, the wage bill will naturally come down because of the number of players. But we're still in a very, very good position and I'm excited about what can be done to try and improve the group.
“The work that's going on, the conversations we've already had, the future planning conversations about where we can get the squad at the start of next season. Clearly my full focus though is between now and the end of the season and trying to finish the season as strongly as we can. Naturally once we get to the end of the season, we'll reassess it from there.”
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