It was a simple decision for Craig Samson.
Eighteen months away from Easter Road had not dulled his affection for Hibs, and the call to return from David Gray only solidified what the 40-year-old describes as a 'no-brainer'. First brought to the club as goalkeeping coach by Jack Ross back in 2020, there are few who have been around the Scottish game to the same extent as the Irvine-born former shot-stopper.
Kilmarnock, Queen of the South, St Johnstone, Dundee United, Ross County, Dundee, St Mirren, Motherwell - Samson's ex-club count tallies up to almost 20 per cent of Scotland's 42-team senior setup. It's that vast experience Gray will have had in mind when he rang his old friend and colleague up for a chat about the possibility of departing Aberdeen for Edinburgh.
As it happened, Samson felt he was already on his way out of Pittodrie, and he needed little convincing that Hibs was where he wanted to go next.
“I was still at Aberdeen and in the process of probably leaving there and when the manager got the job here, I spoke to him and he asked me if I would like to come back. There was never any doubt in my mind; this is where I wanted to go," he told the Hibs Observer. "I kept in touch with the manager when I was away from the club, and I always had great belief in how good he was going to be as a manager, and certainly how good he was going to be for this football club. I wanted to be a part of that as soon as I got that opportunity. It was a no-brainer.
“We've always been in touch. Since I left the club, it's not like we ever stopped speaking or anything like that, and we've played golf here and there. When he got the offer, he wanted me to come, so he phoned me and we had a discussion about it. Even though I was in the process of leaving Aberdeen, it was something we put on the back burner because I wasn’t going to jump ship and make things messy. But I think it was the right thing for me to leave Aberdeen and I think it was the right thing for them as a club. To get the opportunity to come back here was brilliant for me and something that I certainly wouldn't have passed up.”
Samson's return was officially announced as 'goalkeeping coach', but along with Eddie May and Liam Craig, he's been given a broader remit. "We're keen to stress Craig is not just a goalkeeping coach, he's an assistant coach because of what his job entails," said sporting director Malky Mackay back in July, citing Samson's 'reputation' within the game and his 'emotional intelligence' as reasons why Hibs preferred to have him take on a role that was not just limited to coaching between the sticks.
From initial discussions with Gray, Samson says it was immediately clear that they were aligned in several areas. He's been afforded greater input into all first-team matters, and in driving the day-to-day culture around the training ground.
"Sometimes you would join a club as goalie coach, only deal with the goalkeepers and nothing else, which is completely fine. But there's different ways to do things," said Samson. "One of the reasons the manager wanted to bring me back was we had the same opinion on lots of things, the style that we wanted to play and the feeling we wanted to create around the building. I would hate to think that anyone in this building if they needed to speak about something, couldn't come to me if they didn't want to go to the manager, whether it be a player or anyone else.
"That's something that comes with this different role. We'll all sit and discuss the team and talk about different things. Some managers just wouldn't do that, you know, but that's the way we are. The manager's very open with the staff, we're very clear, we're very together to try and get the best results for the club. I do the role that the manager asked me to do. If I wasn't happy with the role, I wouldn't have come back. But we had clear discussions on what he's seen, that bringing me back would help him as a manager and would help this football club to get success. I wouldn't tell any lies to the goalies, and the manager's not told me any - he told me what he wants from me and I've got to deliver that for him on a daily basis."
That being said, Samson's primary responsibility is still coaching Hibs' goalkeepers. Gray's number one this season is, of course, Josef Bursik, a loan recruit from Club Brugge looking to steer his career back on track. He left Stoke City for Belgium in January 2023 with an impressive pedigree - 50 appearances for the Potters and ten England Under-21 caps. Injuries soon got in the way, though, and all Bursik managed last term was six outings for the Belgian side's reserves.
Upon becoming Gray's first summer signing back in June, the expectation was that he would arrive at HTC with a point to prove. Samson says the 24-year-old has been exemplary in how he has applied himself during a somewhat rocky first few weeks in the Scottish Premiership, and he kept a comfortable first league clean sheet in the win over St Johnstone earlier this month.
"It's been brilliant with Josef," said Samson. "He's had what would have been seen as the most high-flying youth career, in which he was a real big prospect within the English football system. But then he got a move that probably didn't work out the way that he hoped it was going to work out. He had some personal loss in his life that made the circumstances more difficult for him, which sometimes people don't often see and then he moved to Bruges and got injured. And from that injury, I think what he learned was what it takes to get back to the levels he wants to be at.
"He's come into this environment and embraced it. He's been excellent with the boys, he gets on with everyone. We work really, really hard with him in training, and he's going to try to put it together to get clean sheets in the games. He's been a breath of fresh air to work with. It's been really good. He's someone who wants to learn. I think if you get somebody who just thinks they know best all the time, it's very difficult, but he certainly doesn't. We'll have discussions every week about things that he can do better, things that he's done well, and he takes them all on board and tries to put it all together in games."
In the long term, though, Hibs have a goalkeeper of their own making whose eyes will be trained firmly on becoming number one. Samson first met Murray Johnson as an aspiring teenager during his first spell at Easter Road and has no hesitation in declaring 'high hopes' for what he can become for the club.
Now approaching his 20th birthday, Johnson is back at Airdrieonians for a second loan spell and has started all six of their Championship fixtures so far. These loans are, of course, an opportunity for young players to accrue invaluable first-team experience that aids their long-term development. But they are classed as part of the learning process for a reason, with Samson maintaining that not only are these moves a chance for young keepers to excel, but also make the mistakes that help shape them in the long run.
Read more:
- Rudi Molotnikov: My Hibs journey and being a role model
- Hibs set for UEFA windfall after Champions League changes
- Hibs 'yet to receive' Rangers ticket details ahead of Ibrox
"I've known Murray since I was here the last time," said Samson. "I believe Murray has a lot of potential to have a good career ahead of him and out playing games for Airdrie is, at the moment, the best thing for him. He went there last season and did really well in a short period of time, which showed them enough that they wanted to take him back for this season. That's something that we were keen to do because I think, certainly as a young goalkeeper, you are going to make mistakes. You're going to play brilliant games and at times you're going to make mistakes.
"Airdrie are well aware that that's the situation you have with a young goalkeeper. But if he keeps improving the way that he is, then he's someone that we've got high hopes for. He's obviously just been in the Scotland Under-21 squad a couple of years before he actually should be in it, which is excellent. He's someone I've got on well with, and I think we can bring the best out of him. But right now he's got a lot of learning to do, a lot of game time to make up. But he is someone with bags of potential."
Read the rules here