Hibs Under 20s face St Johnstone at McDiarmid Park tonight and Head of Academy Coaching James McDonaugh believes tonight’s SPFL U20 League match could the youngsters with their toughest test of the season so far.
Heading into the fixture, the players are in a buoyant mood after securing a 1-0 win over Celtic last week thanks to a goal from top scorer Jason Cummings (pictured), and then EOS team managed to clinch promotion on Saturday. but McDonaugh insists that tonight’s game will be particularly difficult, especially after St Johnstone under-20s won the previous meeting 2-1 at Livingston in early November.
McDonaugh said: “We believe this will be one of our hardest games of the season, but we are looking forward to the challenge.
“St Johnstone were very good when we played them earlier on in the season and deservedly beat us.
“So we know we will need to produce an excellent performance in order to earn a positive result at McDiarmid Park – that’s the challenge that awaits the team.”
Jordan Sinclair is now back fully fit after his injury lay-off and Cody Mulhall (knee) is the only other member of the under-20 squad unavailable for selection.
SPFL Table
Celtic 20 14 2 4 43 19 24 44
Rangers 20 13 5 2 42 20 22 44
Hibernian 21 13 3 5 53 28 25 42
Motherwell 23 12 2 9 45 41 4 38
Hamilton 24 11 5 8 42 38 4 38
Aberdeen 23 11 4 8 45 37 8 37
Inverness CT 22 10 4 8 46 37 9 34
St Johnstone 24 8 6 10 41 44 -3 30
Kilmarnock 23 9 3 11 35 39 -4 30
Partick Th 25 8 5 12 35 49 -14 29
Dunfermline 23 8 3 12 40 42 -2 27
Falkirk 23 6 9 8 37 49 -12 27
Dundee Utd 24 7 4 13 32 35 -3 25
Hearts 23 6 5 12 34 53 -19 23
St Mirren 22 6 4 12 21 33 -12 22
Ross County 22 6 2 14 29 56 -27 20
Photo by John Preece
http://www.photoboxgallery.com/jlp-photography
John graduated from Telford College in 2010 with an HNC in Practical Journalism and since then he worked for the North Edinburgh News, The Southern Reporter, the Irish News Review and The Edinburgh Reporter. In addition he has been published in the Edinburgh Evening News and the Hibernian FC Programme.
