Hibs squad takes positives from Parkhead showing against Celtic

Hibs impressed despite losing to Celtic in October. Pic: SNS

Neil Lennon’s team lost 4-2 in Glasgow on October 20, a defeat which removed them from second place in the Premiership and kicked off their recent seven-game run without a victory.

Despite the scoreline that day, Hibs were deemed to have performed impressively after recovering strongly from a disastrous opening 20 minutes in which they found themselves two goals down. Horgan believes that, if they can start better than they did that day, they will have every chance of claiming a victory this weekend.

“If we hadn’t started so badly, we could potentially have taken something at Parkhead,” the winger said. “You can’t give Celtic an early two-goal start like we did, but we clawed them back to 2-1 and then 3-2. I remember being in the game and thinking ‘we’re going to get a result here, something’s going to happen for us’ but unfortunately they got their fourth goal late on and the game was dead and buried.

“We acquitted ourselves very well in the second half and played some really good stuff. They’re a very good side and it’s always going to be a tough game but if we play as well as we can, we can be a good match for them.”

Although Hibs sit eighth in and are missing several key players through injury, Horgan is adamant that his team will go into the match in bullish mood.

“There’s different ways to play against Celtic, it depends what suits your team,” he said. “But I think we’ll probably go at them. We competed with them at Parkhead so the aim has to be compete again this time and hopefully win.

“We won’t be going into it hoping for a point. We’re going to try and get three points to get a bit of momentum going and kick us up the table.”