Ian Black reveals he turned down Hibs on four occasions

Ian Black celebrates after helping Hearts defeat Hibs in the 2012 Scottish Cup final.

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But it could have been so different on quite a few occasions with three different Hibs managers making an attempt to sign him.

The first time occurred as Black was a youngster as he weighed up the options of whether to go down south or take the offer to stay in Edinburgh.

He told Si Ferry: "Alex McLeish was the manager. To this day I don't understand it, they [Hibs] only offered me a one-year contract when I had all these teams from England offering me three and four-year contracts.

"If they had offered me a three or four-year deal then I might have been there.

"I had played with some of the players who were in the Blackburn youth team so that's what swayed me to go there."

After coming back to Scotland to sign for Inverness Caley Thistle, Black was wanted by then-Hibs boss Mixu Paatelainen.

The Finnish coach finally thought he'd landed his target when Black agreed to join Hibs as his contract with Inverness was set to expire, only for Hearts to jump in at the last minute.

He said: "Mixu tried to buy me twice from Inverness.

"I was up at seven in the morning. Went down, got everything sorted; medical and that, everything was done. I left my agent to deal with the paperwork.

"Then my agent phoned and said Hearts wanted me and asked if I could get to Tynecastle. I was like, 'I'll be there in a minute'.

Asked if he would've signed for Hibs if Hearts hadn't come in, he added, with a twist: "Aye. It was four times I knocked Hibs back. Inverness twice, when I was younger and Pat Fenlon phoned me after we pumped them in the final."

Ian Black reveals he turned down Hibs on four occasions - including after 5-1 final