Top line summary

  • Says Hibs were 'outfought, outran and outcompeted'.
  • Feels fan booing has been harsh in the past but 'fully justified' today.
  • Unsure if Miller, Boyle or Hanlon will be available for Celtic.

Nick Montgomery spoke to the media after Hibs' 3-0 loss at home to St Mirren. Here's everything the manager had to say.

What can you say about that?

“It’s a real difficult one to take. Disappointing. The first half was nowhere near good enough. We got outfought, outran, outcompeted – and we gave away sloppy goals. From there, it’s a mountain to climb against a decent team. Being outfought and outcompeted, there’s not many times I’ve said that here. But I have to accept that. The players accept that. It’s nowhere near good enough. In the second half we huffed and puffed. But you can’t get back into a game after showing that first-half performance.

Being outfought and outcompeted - how do you change that?

“There’s been a lot of change, a lot of new players coming in. Paul Hanlon pulling out again this week meant I had to start young Nectar, who has only played a few games this season. None of them are excuses. They’re just facts. But this is probably the first time I’ve said we’ve been outcompeted. We understand, and I understand as a manager, that it’s not acceptable. We have to get ready for another tough game midweek and prepare for that one.

There were boos and people leaving early, can you understand the supporters' frustrations today?

“I can understand the supporters’ frustration, this season. There have been times this season where we’ve played really well and not got the result we deserve – and sometimes a couple of boos have been unjust. But today they were fully justified. We deserved the booing at half-time. At the end of the game? The second half was a lot better, we competed more, were probably unlucky not to get a goal or two and get back in the game. It wasn’t to be. But it was too late. We can’t give three-goal leads. We’ve come back from 2-0 down twice this season but 3-0 down is difficult. I came in this morning with good energy at the end of a busy week bringing new players. It's going to take a little bit of time to get them into training and get them to gel but I still thought we could have got a result today if we started better than we did. We just didn't start the game so I accept that.

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"Last week we had that character. At Kilmarnock, not an easy place to go, we started really well and somehow went 2-0 down but we fought our way back into it and should have won it. There's good characters and good leaders in there but today there wasn't. There was a lot of frustration there at half-time from myself and the players. We had to show more fight, more leadership and more desire and we didn't do that in the first half. The second half was better but the game was dead by then and we were chasing an uphill task. We got exactly what we deserved."

Will you have any of the internationals back on Wednesday?

"We're hoping Lewis Miller and Martin Boyle will come back but Rocky Bushiri is still away. Without bringing Triantis in we'd have only had one centre-back in Will Fish so it was a big ask starting Triatnsi. He needs a little bit of a game time. I'm not sure if they (Miller and Boyle) will be back for the game, hopefully they'll be back in the next couple of days."

Will Paul Hanlon be back?

!I'm not sure. He's had a bit of an illness on and off for the last couple of weeks so we'll just have to see if he recovers."