Hibs chief executive Leeann Dempster never considered quitting over manager storm

Hibs chief executive Leeann Dempster speaks to the press. Pic: SNS

However, she did admit she was disappointed at how Lennon’s two-and-a-half years at Easter Road came to an end, the Northern Irishman and his assistant Garry Parker initially suspended before leaving “by mutual consent” a few days later.

Dempster conceded that the lack of detail as to the circumstances surrounding Lennon’s exit had created a vacuum which was filled by speculation as to what had exactly happened, but insisted the agreement struck between both parties that neither would talk about the subject meant a blanket of secrecy will remain in place.

Agreeing the experience of the past few weeks hasn’t been pleasant, she said: “If you want to be popular, don’t join a football club. People say you live or die by your decisions and all that malarkey. You make decisions all through life and take the consequences. I don’t think I’m any better or worse at making decisions than other people – I just have to make them in this instance in the public eye.”

Lennon’s departure and the lengthy process to find his replacement in former Barnsley and Leeds United boss Paul Heckingbottom have drawn accusations of a lack of ambition within Easter Road, a charge Dempster, pictured below, hotly denied.

She said: “What does ambition mean? We are backing ourselves. We back the people here, we back the team here, we back the structure. And people keep saying ‘Oh, what’s this fabulous structure’.

“It’s just a lot of good people working collaboratively with some of the best tech, some of the best equipment, some of the best minds – all to get those gains that will help us be better.

“I’m not specifically relating this to anybody, but there’s a general chat about a lack of ambition at the club.

“Well, I’ll have a stand-up argument with anybody who says that. Because it’s not true. Ambition can be sometimes confused with recklessness and it’s my job to make decisions that are as positive as they can be, get us continually moving forward.

“But I need to check the pace of that movement and work within a framework.

I suppose that’s been one element of the criticism that annoys me. Because I think the club has been ambitious. I think the club is ambitious, the people who work here are ambitious, the team are and the supporters are.

“And because we’ve had a change of head coach – which happens at other clubs, by the way – it doesn’t make us any less ambitious. We had a fantastic last season and Neil and the players rightly got all the plaudits; straight out of the Championship, some would argue we were where we should be, some would say we went further. But clubs can’t, and shouldn’t, be judged just on a tiny window, a tiny time frame.

“Football is a magnificent game, it keeps us all in a living because you don’t know what’s going to happen from game to game, it’s never predictable.”

Although she found herself taking flak from some quarters, Dempster insisted she didn’t consider it was time for her to leave the club saying: “That’s a question for other people rather than myself.

“Other’s may have had that opinion, others in the press and maybe some supporters. I didn’t consider my position at all. I didn’t at all. If other people did, they certainly didn’t vocalise it to me.”

Asked how she felt the situation had been handled, Demptster said: “Big decisions are always difficult. Was I disappointed how things ended? Absolutely. It’s always disappointing when you transition from one head coach to another. But you need to just focus and get on with the task in hand and that was to bring a new person to the club.

“Folk want to know everything and when the club’s not briefing [the media], there is a vacuum to be filled and I felt it wasn’t right for us to add to that speculation. Has it been difficult? It’s not been pleasant, let’s be honest, it never is.”