Hibs debrief: Poor performances all round, Lee Johnson's formation error, moment you may have missed

A look back at Saturday’s match at Easter Road after Hibs lost 3-1 to Motherwell in the cinch Premiership.

Player of the match

Safe to say this isn’t an easy award to select due to the extreme lack of any viable candidates. Kevin Nisbet scored and was unlucky with another chance, so he’s probably the stand-out option. There’s not really much else to analyse. It was a dreadfully poor performance with so many players off it. Even those who’ve been playing recently – Will Fish, CJ Egan-Riley, Josh Campbell, Jimmy Jeggo – really struggled to make a positive impact on the game.

Defining moment

Will Fish and Jimmy Jeggo cut a frustrated look during Hibs' 3-1 defeat at home to Motherwell. Picture: SNS

The concession of the penalty by David Marshall which enabled Motherwell to double their advantage after Sean Goss opened the scoring. It came at a period at the start of the second half where the visitors were putting on real pressure as the reaction Hibs fans were hoping from their players failed to materialise. It was also a bit of a shambles with a hit-and-hope ball lofted back into the danger area that somehow found Blair Spittal, who was then taken out by the goalkeeper. Marshall’s performance was another key factor. All in all it summed up the day.

Ref watch

Graham Grainger got the penalty call right, which was his only big decision to make during the game.

Benefit of hindsight

Keeping the 3-5-2 was a mistake by Lee Johnson. Yes, it worked at Celtic Park to a degree, so there’s a certain rationale to sticking with the same shape after a good performance, but this was a completely different type of contest. He did change back to the 4-3-3 after Van Veen was sent through on the goalkeeper for the second time in the first half, but the team was already stuck in a rut by that point and chasing the game at 1-0 down. They couldn’t rouse themselves back to the level of performance witnessed in the games before the Rangers defeat.

Moment you may have missed

Will Fish saw his boot fly into the air and land 20 yards away after he attacked a second-half clearance.

Message from the editor

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