Changing Times - Interview with Leeann Dempster

Leeann Dempster arrived at Hibernian in the worst possible circumstances. Having been sounded out and recruited by a Hibernian board that knew the club needed to change, and knew who they wanted to lead the change many months before Terry Butcher oversaw the horrendous decline in results that saw the club relegated, Leeann's first week in post could hardly have been more challenging.

With the backdrop of an angry support clamouring for the removal of Rod Petrie, Leeann took over a club that should have been looking forward to a Scottish Premiership campaign in a league without Hearts and Rangers, but instead found itself facing up to life in the Championship alongside their city rivals, and the Glasgow club working its way up the divisions following liquidation two years previously. 

If Hibs couldn't have picked a worse time to be relegated (not that there is ever a good time), Leeann Dempster also couldn't have picked a more challenging time to take control of the club. I have been looking at the changes at Hibernian since that point in time, and I've been grateful to have been given time with people within the club who have been able to give me their perspective on life at Hibs in the time since the Rod Petrie protests. 

Earlier this week, I spent some time at Easter Road with Leeann, to get her perspective on the journey so far, and how she sees that journey progressing in the coming months and years.  

I came away from the meeting with renewed optimism not just about the season, but for the future of the football club. There is a clear plan in place, thought out, considered, and clearly defined. The club knows where it wants to go, and knows how to get there. When I think back to the summer of 2012, and the Working Together meetings of that time, there was nothing to suggest that such a plan. It was no surprise, having seen the club close up at that period, that we were on a downward spiral. 

Conversely, it will be no surprise to me that we will find ourselves on an upward trajectory before too long. From the conversation around the interview, it was clear that every aspect of the club has had a root and branch review. 

From the catering - some of which will be coming in-house - to how supporters interact with the club on a match day, to how supporters can share life events like birthdays, weddings, memorials, etc. All of this is done with a view to growing the income to fund the first team. 

Everything is geared towards making the first team successful, and is about sowing the seeds from which the club can grow and flourish in an effective and sustainable way, where the fortunes of the club don't rest on the shoulders of a management team as they have in the past. 

Everything is geared towards making Hibernian great again.

You met the supporters while the protest against Rod Petrie were going on outside the West Stand, as supporters we can see there has been a change, but how would you describe the biggest difference at the club?

The biggest difference, well there are so many differences because I don't believe that there is any part of the club that has been untouched since the first of June 2014, so that's a hard one to hone down. 

Culturally the club is very different. I was attracted to come to this club in the first place because there was absolute potential bursting all over the place, and I really didn't have to think twice when I got the opportunity to come here. So I think that in itself tells you the sort of gravitas that I felt for the club.

It was a really, really attractive proposition for me from a professional perspective because I could see the opportunity. 

I felt there was a disconnect in many ways. Football is all about the supporters and the relationship with the supporters. You can be football team but if you don't have the supporters with you and you don't have your supporters coming through the gates, then you won't achieve anything because you will remain at a much smaller size and you won't leverage the capabilities that are there.

I thought there was a massive opportunity to change that up, and to be honest it was quite an easy fix.

When you think about the headwinds there - you were in that meeting - in a really strange way it made me more - I was pretty determined anyway - but it made me more determined with what was going on outside and what was going on in the meeting.

The raw emotion reassured me in a way because it showed me that the supporters wanted the club to be successful.

That really energised me. It was like starting a mission, it wasn't like a labour of love - I'm not going to be crass and pretend that I was a Hibernian supporter since I was five, but I'm absolutely a Hibernian supporter now, but it feels like an absolute mission now, it feels like a labour of love now. Everyone that comes in here now and everyone working with us now, I believe it feels the same way for them as well. You see the reaction on a Saturday when we achieve something and when we don't achieve things, and the pain is as real for us as it is for everyone else, and I think that's a good thing to have within the staff base here because it connects everyone back. 

I think the change has been that relationship - that rebuilding of the relationship with supporters - and I don't think 'relationship' is the right word for it, because the connection between a football club and the supporters is something special, and if football clubs don't recognise that then they're missing out.

There's all the structural things, all the re-structure and rebuilding of the football side, and we did that in a very different way to how we had done it in the past. That's not me passing comment on whether it was done properly or not in the past, it was very much the model that many football clubs had followed, we just came at it in a very different way.It's been well talked about this idea of technical coaches supported properly. 

When clubs get relegated they tend to contract, and even in the face of the headwinds and everything that was facing us at that point we never did that. We stayed true to the plan that we came to the club with. 

My first appointment was George Craig, and George has been one of the mainstays and a hugely important element of the development of the club, and the development of the club in the years to come. So when we talk about the football plan, him and I always worked well together. He was one of the first people I connected with when I came into football and I knew I wanted someone as strong as him to come and start this with me.

When you talk about potential, what do you see that potential being?

I think even though we're in the Championship and we have to fight to get out of the Championship at the minute - so some people might think 'dream on' - but this is a capital city club. It has a high number of supporters coming through the gates, it has the potential to probably bring double that again. 

With that brings the club the opportunity and the funds to continue to improve. This club shouldn't be happy to just get back into the Premier league.

Over time, and whatever defined period of time that is, we want to be in the top echelons of the Scottish game, so not just a top six club, we want to be up there challenging at the top of that league, challenging for the European spots, and participating at that level. 

We also know we have to get there first, we also know that we have done some of the work and there's a lot more work to get us there. I've been fortunate enough to enjoy that stuff in my time in the game, and I believe I understand what it takes to achieve that. and this club has every ingredient to achieve that, and more.

I want us to be challenging for cups and getting to finals and semi-finals. We should be doing that on an ongoing basis. Our aspirations are no different to any other clubs', but I think they are realistic. Hibernian is a massive club - that's the old cliche, big club/massive club, but we  are. Everything about us suggests that, and supporters won't be satisfied until we're back doing what we should be doing, until we're back taking our role at the table at Scottish football again.

We also need to respect the league we're in at the minute, respect the teams that we compete against at the minute, and do all we possibly can to make that leap and get up.

We have massive aspirations for this club. Aspirations for an elite club, and aspirations for a community involvement, or hub for Edinburgh. I think football misses an opportunity because we interact with people daily, not just at the weekends, but daily. The emotion associated with football is raw and special, and if we can interact in any way outside of the sport we should do that. Clubs are wakening up to that and I don't want us to be at the back of the queue. 

How will you know when that community aspiration is achieved, what will it look like?

Look at this stadium today,we've walked around it. How many rooms are here? We want the stadium to be a dedicated point for local people, people in Edinburgh to come and use it. 

We are a founding partner of a public social partnership called Gamechanger, which in itself is probably a whole other meeting. That is all about football, equality, social justice, and health.

We would like this site (Easter Road) and Ormiston, outwith what we use it for the elite football side - and that's always a given that it's for elite football - to be used for the benefit of the community and the people that live around us.

We need to make it as accessible as possible, and it's not just about affordability, we can take that right out of the equation, we are not just sitting in a football stadium at the minute, we're sitting in a massive community asset. Four big empty buildings, with lots of land and opportunities for it to be used, and Gamechanger is a public social partnership, it's the first of it's kind where football is involved. It's innovative in the extreme, and supporters will start to hear more about that in the sphere of what we're doing in community.

I don't want to diminish the football elite side of things, but this is a building block for us.

I guess that's what it means, does it mean you come here for drop-in clinics? Well actually, there's potential for primary care to be located within the stadium, and for that primary care to be supported by third sector organisations, so actually the stadium becomes a dedicated health hub, and within that there are education environments, within that there are business start-up environments, and within that the opportunity for social enterprise. All the things that we consume as a football club could be supplied by social enterprise. 

That's five stages away, or two, or three stages away. That's where football clubs become active in their community because they give people jobs, re-educate them, give them places to start their business, give them places to do their community work, and we are no different, we have that kind of space. 

The roots of the football club are in community, does that influence your thinking?

Does it influence my thinking? It's clearly connected to where the club was founded but for me I've always been a person who's interested in the social side of life so it wasn't my motivator.

My motivator was that I think football clubs should be involved and do things, it shouldn't just be about community football. Community football is a nice starting point but it should be about other things. I'm sure many football clubs have been started in the same way around activities for, I suppose, the most needy in life at that particular point in time.

It's a nice coincidence, but it's not a motivator. I spend a lot of time thinking about what a football club looks like outside of football.

What aspects of the changes you have made so far have you taken most satisfaction from?

I think the new football structure - and I include the academy in this - it still has to achieve things, and I know that, but I'm really, really happy with the development of that and the foundations we've put down there. It gives me a lot of satisfaction that I've been involved in that.
The biggest thing is that I think a lot of supporters are now looking forward to the games, to coming to the games, look forward to what the club are doing, and what the club has to offer. That communication and that openness is probably the thing that gives me most satisfaction. 

Supporters are feeling happier and proud of their club in a strange way,I don't know if those are the right words, you're proud when you win something, people want to come to games and be entertained when they pay their money then go up the road. I've said before football is a different emotional connector, if you don't recognise that or appreciate that, you shouldn't be in the game.

If I can take you back to a Working Together meeting where you said you hoped to get to ten thousand season ticket holders, we're sitting at seven thousand eight hundred. What difference would those additional two thousand two hundred season tickets have made?

There's the obvious financial difference, there's no doubt about it. We wrestled a wee bit with that ten thousand figure, whether to go with it or not because when you put a number on it you could set yourself up for failure if you do, or you could be accused of having no ambition if you don't.

I think with the campaign around season tickets, you've noticed a visible change in how we communicate with supporters.

There's more about coming back, falling in love or at least become interested again. The tone of season ticket campaign video really kick started that, we saw some great early uptake on that. We are about six or seven hundred up on where we were this time last year. I think we finished around seven thousand eight hundred-ish last year including the half-season tickets. 

Of course it makes a massive difference, of course money coming through the turnstiles makes a massive difference. Every thousand season tickets that people buy increases the club's revenue by a quarter of a million pounds. That's significant, there's no getting away from that.

I'm probably jumping onto another subject here, but having HSL and the share issue live at the same time - there was a lot happening for people, so I think people made choices about the things that they did.

People that could afford to did a number of things, people could afford to do one thing, did one thing. People that didn't buy a season ticket bought shares. Because of HSL and the share issue it's allowed us to step forward with some confidence to go into the market for players, do things over the summer knowing that the supporters were behind us. So, for me, it's an amalgamation of a number of things, it's season tickets, it's the income from the share issue and it's the ongoing income from HSL, all of that stuff has made a marked difference. 

We're not up to speed yet in terms of the full team of people here.I think that will make a difference as well, it's smaller but it's more incremental income, as our group get together. 

That will make a difference because everyone operationally is...well you saw Colin (Millar), as an example, he was a guy who dedicated his time as a volunteer, worked through the Work Together groups, was very active, got the opportunity to do things for the club and now has a career in sport. These are the things that football does well.

We want more people to buy tickets, we need more people to buy tickets, and invest cash in the club in whatever way they see fit.

We know that if you are successful on the pitch it inevitably brings people through the gates. Marketing campaigns, messaging, and personalisation, is one way, but the one thing that brings people back is winning. 

The more we show people we have depth as a club, we'll bring people back.

Football in Scotland is in an interesting, positive time. All we've heard since 2008/2009/2010 is how difficult the game in Scotland is. All that's done is made football clubs look at what they've done in terms of recruitment and young players.

I don't know the stats, probably someone who follows these things will drag them out, but it feels like we have more young players playing these days. We have more being exported over the UK and in Europe, and that shows that the technical aspects of the game in Scotland are thriving.

There's strong competition in the Premier League, we've seen crowds coming back out, you've seen at Hearts there's crowds coming back out, great crowds coming out at Aberdeen. All of that, whether it's your team or not your team, is magnificent for the game because it shows football is still rooted there, and if you have the right product at the right time then fans will come out and support it.

We're in a very interesting development point for the club, and it coincides with a good period in the game as well, and that creates various opportunities for the club and we're well placed to take advantage of it.

When you talk about success bringing the fans back along with other things, how much more difficult does it make your task when we find ourselves going into October with the first team clinging onto the title race by its fingernails?

We never started again this season the way we might have wanted to start it but the season's a long old slog. So, the league is far from over. People were telling us it was over after two weeks. It's far from over. 

I would never say I was disappointed by the number of people that come through the gates, I think that's disrespectful to supporters to say that. I think all we can do is talk about the development of the club at the point it's at at the minute, and people will either believe us or they won't believe us. 

They either trust us or they don't trust us, and if they trust us they'll stay with us for the duration. If they like us they'll stay with us for the duration, and if they don't trust us they'll tell us soon enough - and we'll be adult enough to face into that. 

We always need and want people to come through the gates. If you want to feed the club, if you want to keep the players out there, if you want us to get the John McGinns of this world then we need to feed the club. We can't expect someone else to do it for us. We need to feed the club, but we need to get the message out there in the nature it's intended, and not as a lecture of responsibility and what have you. 

So, win games on the trot, keep clean sheets, score goals, all of those things create excitement, moments between family... and Wednesday night for me was a brilliant game, a great game of football. I really enjoyed it, and I was on the edge of my seat the whole time. We don't know what happens after that, but there will be people who go away from there saying "That was the first game I went back to, and it was a good game to go back to." Those are the memories I want to create, but we do need people to come back, we can say it softly and we can say it nicely but we do need it, and hopefully the football and the other stuff brings them back.

How difficult have you found it getting that message out in the way it's intended, without sounding like a lecture?

I think you've seen this kind of a development of a narrative within the club, and I think we're trying to keep to that. There is a comms plan that sits behind it, we've tried to price responsibly when we can, we've tried to build value in where we can. 

It comes back to the idea of feeding the club again, there needs to be a balance.You never get everything right all the time. We've had to make some decisions that we know will be palatable to some and unpalatable to others, but that's like everything else in life. 

We've created this narrative and I don't think people are buying into it because it's a marketing thing, it's because it's true.  I believe where the club is in its life at the moment, by 2025 we have a club that's 150 years old, it will be different to the club, hopefully in a more positive way, to the club that we have at the minute and very different to the club that we had last year. 

It depends how much supporters want to get involved. Some want to come to the game, sit down watch the game and disappear, and that's fine. Others want to become more entrenched in the club and be involved. It's about getting it as personal as we can. We do want to get to know our supporters and show them real appreciation for sticking by us over a difficult number of years. 

There's no point pretending that's not the case - it has been the case. It's a fact. If you pretend all that never happened people just think it's another bit of marketing spin.

I speak to loads of folk on a match day, I try my best to get around the stadium, I try my best not just to stay in hospitality but to go outside. Just do small things, when you've got kids standing outside waiting for autographs it only takes a minute to bring them in,it takes two minutes to take them pitch-side and give them a ball and let them run about, it's hardly any effort for us but those memories last a lifetime.

For us, we work here, we walk up and down the stadium. My office looks onto the stadium, if you are a Hibernian supporter you would love to work in an office like that. It becomes normal to us, but that young lad or young girl waiting outside waiting to see their favourite player, we can bring them in and let them sit in the dug-outs, it's brilliant.

My friend and I did the Football Fans in Training and being able to change in the dressing room and do laps of the pitch was brilliant, so I can relate to that. 

I arrived during the Football Fans in Training, but the dressing rooms weren't being used, so guys were needing to come dressed, or get changed in the toilets or whatever. I asked why they didn't use the dressing rooms, and it was "Well, that's the first team, so.." but I said so long as it's returned in a good condition we're happy to let you use them. 

That added a dynamic to it, they were lying not being used so if it means another twenty people or forty people come then all the better. 

We talk about a bad period for the club, which it clearly has been. Will we only be out of that bad period when we achieve promotion, or do you think we're on our way out now?

I think it depends on your perspective. We need to be promoted, everything that we are working towards is about us playing in the top league in Scotland. Not just playing and participating, but being an active challenger at the top, challenging for European spots and all the rest of it. 

It depends on your perspective. I have the privilege of working here and seeing the people that work here and I see the work that goes in. I see the hours that everyone puts in and the effort and everything is done to get the best output for the club.

In a way I think we are out of the worst period, because we've done a lot of hard work. We've done a lot of work,  but there will be supporters who believe that until we're in the top league nothing has improved, nothing's change and that's their prerogative and their perspective. That's the whole dynamic of the game, everyone has an opinion.

You look at the boards, debate rages on every topic. Listen to the radio on a Saturday and debate rages on every topic. If you went to a football match knowing you would win every game three nothing you'd stop going because you'd be bored. It'd be nice, but you'd be bored. 

What message would you want to give to fans who are on the fence, maybe been to a couple of games, but are swithering on whether they want to come back?

People wanted change at the club. They told us they wanted change, they physically demonstrated that they wanted it to change. They wanted a different culture, a different approach, different communications, a whole raft of changes. 

They wanted a change at the top and I would argue that they've had that. It's been many, many months since I've been asked the question, but I have full responsibility for the club. I think people don't ask me that question any longer because it's pretty self-evident. 

People asked for that change. If you don't want to come back until we're promoted then that's entirely your prerogative. Everyone has free will, everyone can choose what they want to do.

I would say, if you can, in whatever way it is, be part of it now, play your part now. If it's only in a small way we'd be grateful for it. If it's in a big way, then all the better. 

I look forward to coming in every day. Every day there's a new challenge. Every day there's something to build upon for the game coming towards us. We have a strong reporting structure, not overloading people, but we understand the different elements of the different departments that we work within and how they overlap. We have a Hibs Kids day coming up on the 17th October, and we'll work hard to make sure that's a great Hibs Kids day.

Hopefully that'll mean the kids and their parents will have a brilliant day that day and we'll get the result we want, but it'll not just be about coming in with your ticket and going to a kiosk or whatever, we'll create events round about it. 

We don't use the stadium well enough on a match day. There could be great fan environments, great fan zones around it, there  could be interesting interactions for the supporters. 

People could come to the stadium earlier and use it in a different way. We have the motivation to do that, but you can divert your attention away and we want to focus on getting promoted. 

There's things that we are doing now that if we were in the Premier League we'd probably do them slightly different but we're focussing everything, a lot of our energies on the first team, focussed on the performance of the first team, that group in here and how we connect with the supporters. 

The work that has been done with the first team, the work that's been done with the academy, the new recruitment structures, the people working for the club, the renewed relationships with boy's clubs - the amateur game in Edinburgh is great - we've gone from something like 0.1% community activity at the training centre to almost 50/50, in fact maybe higher than that now. 

That has no impact on the elite side of things, they still get everything that they need, and everything that they should get. It also means that facility is doing everything that it should be doing for the wider community. 

This is what we're striving for, because it's hard to pick up new supporters. There's Netflix, Amazon Prime, PS4, 3D TV's, football happens live and it happens in a stadium and I want more people to figure that one out and get themselves down here. 

 

I'd like to thank Leeann Dempster and Colin Millar for helping make these interviews happen. 

So a Season Starts..

Hibernian bounced back from a tumultuous couple of weeks with a comfortable League Cup win against Montrose on Saturday. Hibs haven't had their troubles to seek over the last fortnight, fending off Rangers in their bid to lure Scott Allan west in the week leading up to their embarrassing 2-6 defeat to the Glasgow side in the Petrofac Training Cup.

Despite Hibs' repeated assertions that Allan would not be sold to Rangers, a second bid was received and promptly rejected, with rumblings of a third bid continuing to populate the sports press in Scotland, although Rangers manager Mark Warburton has himself refused to confirm any third bid.

The issue clearly had an impact on Hibs, Allan started that match on the bench, leaving an already depleted side further weakened. Allan came on in the second half to replace Jordon Forster, who appeared to have been injured following a late challenge, and although individually Allan's performance was positive, the side collapsed as Rangers ran rampant.

If that was a week to forget for Hibs, the gloom continued into the following week when Allan handed in a written transfer request, which was subsequently rejected by Leeann Dempster and Alan Stubbs. Hibs, it would be fair to say, came out swinging with some bold, chest-thumping statements making clear their position that they were not prepared to weaken their own side at the Ibrox's side benefit.

Hibs' response has largely found favour amongst their own supporters. For too long, the Hibs support have seen their best talent moved on, only to be replaced by players of an inferior quality. It is not an approach that has served the football club well, and resulted in a steady downward trajectory from the high point of their CIS Insurance Cup win back in 2007.

The digging in of the heels and steadfast refusal to buckle under intense pressure was another positive indication that Dempster and Stubbs are doing more than just paying lip-service towards Hibs' promotion aspirations this season. Prior to the Allan saga, Hibs movements in the transfer market had been positive, the signing of Fraser Fyvie represented a real coup for the club as Fraser is undoubtedly well equipped to perform in the Scottish Premiership, and there was interest from several clubs eager to bring him on board. Yet he chose Hibernian, clearly sold on the ambition of Stubbs and Dempster. The signing of James Keatings from city rivals Hearts was as surprising as it was welcome, and was a further sign that Hibs are building a strong squad for the coming campaign.

The charm offensive has continued following the rejection of Allan's transfer request, as Hibs have sought to regain the positivity that was engulfing the club prior to Rangers' approach for Allan. A contract extension for Alan Stubbs and his coaching team was warmly welcomed by the support, and this was followed by the announcement that former St Mirren player, and Scotland Under-21 star, John McGinn had signed, with Hibs having met St Mirren's valuation of the player with the minimum of fuss or fanfare. McGinn had a number of options both at home and abroad, so his signing again represents tangible evidence that Dempster's priorities lie firmly in giving Alan Stubbs the best possible chance of returning Hibernian to the top flight of Scottish football.

Any decision to sell Allan to Rangers would have been preposterous, the notion that Hibs would risk their own title aspirations to enhance those of the club seen as their main title rivals is ridiculous. Simply put, had Hibs agreed to the move, the steady trickle of season ticket renewals would likely have halted at that point, and the good feeling that Dempster has worked tirelessly to bring to the support would have evaporated, with any trust being promptly lost.

Instead, Hibs have played their hand well, and can hopefully turn the situation to their advantage. Hibs are expected to announce the signings of Keith Watson and former Rangers youth player Rhys McCabe  in the coming days if rumours are to be believed, and if Dempster and Stubbs can continue to demonstrate the link between supporters backing the club and the club being able to do such business, then they may find that the steady season ticket trickle turns into a healthy flow of renewals and new take-ups.

Stubbs deserves a mention at this point for how he has handled Scott Allan. It was right to start Allan on the bench against Rangers. Neither Allan nor Stubbs were in a position where a positive outcome was likely. Stubbs, if he had started Allan would have put the player in a position where the reactions of both sets of supporters would have caused an unwelcome distraction, and leaving him out altogether would only have fuelled the fires suggesting that the transfer was imminent.

Stubbs left Allan on the bench for the cup win against Montrose as well, and his  decision to introduce Allan midway through the second half meant that Allan's introduction into the fray was very open, very public, and invited the support to make their feelings known. The reaction was mixed, a few boos could be heard but these were largely replaced by applause, with the Easter Road faithful choosing to back rather than barrack their player. Scott's first touches on the ball were met with a similar response, though a moment of magic from the player had the Hibs support on their feet when he fired Hibs into a two goal lead. Nothing wins the fans round quicker than a good performance on the pitch.

Hibs' performance was comfortable without ever reaching the heights of some of their performances last season. New signing Marvin Bartley impressed, providing the midfield with the strong ball-winner that they missed last season. The side that finished the game had a real look of the development squad, with Stubbs using the game to blood a few youngsters, who, while playing their part in the win, still look short of the standard required to mount a title campaign at this very early stage in their careers.

Stubbs later admitted to Hibs TV that although he was pleased to be able to give some game-time to the young players, his hand had been somewhat forced with an injury list that contains the likes of Martin Boyle, Dan Carmichael, Farid El Alagui, James Keatings, Jordon Forster, and Dominique Malonga. With the Scott Allan situation depriving Stubbs of Allan's services in the early stages of the game, it left the Hibs boss with little in the way of cover.

In fairness to those that did play, they moved the ball relatively well with only occasional sloppiness in their passing. The home side, as would be expected, dominated from first whistle to last , with Montrose content to sit in and try to frustrate Stubbs' men. Scott Martin clipped home Hibs' opener, the youngster's composed finish looked more like that of an experienced first teamer than that of a young man enjoying only his second competitive start for the first team.

It was, though, the introduction of Scott Allan that lifted the Hibs side. It is not hard to understand why Rangers were so keen to secure his services, aside from what he would bring to their side, what it would take from Hibs is almost as relevant. Allan injected some pace and directness to the proceedings, picking passes that opened up the Montrose defence, and embarking on mazy runs that pulled players out of position leaving space for his colleagues to exploit.

Jason Cummings, who had led the line splendidly all afternoon, rounded off the win with a fine shot on the turn from inside the box. I felt that Cummings looked like all he had to his game was goals last season (hardly a bad thing for a striker, indeed, such a bad thing that he finished the Championship's top scorer at the tender age of 19!), however he looked stronger, fitter, and more intelligent in his play on Saturday. I was impressed with his understanding of when to come deep, and when not to. He brought others into play well, and looked for any opportunity to get a shot away.

Cummings, who was celebrating his 20th birthday, richly deserved his goal as a reward for his contribution. The goal was his second in consecutive competitive games, and few would bet against him topping the goal-scoring charts this season again.

Hibs now look forward to Saturday's league opener at Dumbarton. With a few of the injured players getting closer to match readiness, Hibs are now well equipped to mount a serious challenge to Rangers' title hopes. If Hibs can indeed keep this squad together, and get more fans back on board for the ride, then Hibs will be in a great position to put the darkness of the last couple of weeks well and truly behind them.

The Hibernian Way

Hibernian couldn't have timed the release of next season's season tickets any better if they'd tried. A run of five consecutive victories sees Hibs sitting second in the league, and with a Hampden Scottish Cup Semi-Final against Falkirk to look forward to.

A comfortable, if unspectacular, 4-0 victory over ex-Hearts midfielder Colin Cameron's Berwick Rangers ensured Hibernian had their name in Sunday's cup draw, and left the Hibs support with a growing optimism which Hibs will hope to capitalise on in greater season ticket numbers.

For me, not renewing isn't an option. As soon as I got home from work this afternoon, the purchase was made for me and my son, with a text message sent to my Dad to remind him to renew his seat beside us. It hasn't always been an easy decision to renew, we're never flush for cash so it is a selfish purchase in that it's only really me and Josh that benefit from the season tickets. My wife and daughters attend occasionally but mostly it's me, Josh, and my Dad at the football. 

Last season, when things started to slide at Hibs it would have been easy to skip the renewal and pick and choose the games I went to. In fact, Hibs have been poor for a number of seasons and so it's not hard to understand why season ticket numbers have dwindled. Consecutive cup finals in 2012 and 2013 bolstered numbers as a season ticket guaranteed a cup final ticket, but without the  lure of cup final tickets,  the numbers dropped drastically for this season. 

The quality of football is only one factor in the decision to renew, the league we are in as another - last season an early renewal meant paying SPL prices for Championship football. Personally, it's not something I'm that fussed about - it's Hibs I go to see more than it is the opposition. I also appreciate that the more people buy a season ticket, the more money Hibs have to put a squad together. This season, that money has been used fantastically well, with almost every signing Alan Stubbs has brought to the club demonstrating great value for money. 

Crucially though, it's time I get to spend with Josh and my Dad that I otherwise would struggle to get. I remember the rare occasions that my Dad took me to the football when I was wee. Geography and finances (and my Dad's inability to drive) meant that I didn't get to many games. After we moved to Edinburgh I started seeing more of Hibs, when I'd go with either my Dad, my cousins James and John, or my Aunty Anne and Uncle Danny (in fact, it tended to be my Uncle Danny's season ticket in the old North Stand that I used, so I attended more with my Aunty Anne than anyone else. 

I loved going. Easter Road was a very different place to the one that I take Josh to, but it's still an immensely special place to me. We moved seats recently, the seats we had were in a quiet section of the lower West Stand, close to the away end and away from the livelier sections of the ground. On the biggest of games where seats were at a premium, the seats were decent, but most of the time it felt like we were away from the action. Ironically, we moved further away from the pitch, to seats in the penultimate row of the upper tier of the West Stand. We are fairly central and there are very few seats spare in our section. The atmosphere is much better and the feeling at games is much closer to the one I experienced as a kid in broadly the same area of the stadium. 

Taking Josh is special, he takes it badly when Hibs lose and buzzes when we win. Seeing him crushed after a bad defeat makes them harder to take for me as well, but the need to lift his spirits helps me get over the bad ones quickly. It's special going with my Dad as well. Circumstances dictate that I rarely get out for a pint or a meal with him, so the ritual we have now of me picking him up from his house, anticipating the game in the car and reviewing it on the way home is as much a part of the decision to buy a season ticket as the football itself. 

The other big factor in my season ticket purchase that is really specific to this moment in time is the revival of the football club under Leeann Dempster. Following the disastrous cup final in 2012, I attended a Let's Work Together meeting at Easter Road, This was a forum for Hibs fans to engage in a meaningful way with the club to try and improve things. 

At that meeting, there was a question and answer session with then-Chief Exec Scott Lindsay. I asked who at the club set the culture, and the answer was that it was down to the manager. I asked how that could work with managers changing every year and a half (give or take). There was an admission that it hadn't really worked, and that there was no definitive culture at the football club. That amazed me, but in hindsight, it was hardly surprising. 

Over the next year or so, I worked with a smaller group of supporters within the Working Together team, and with Non-Exec Director Brian Houston to put together a piece of work with the working title "Winning the Hibernian Way". We looked at the whole ethos of the football club, how it set targets, what the values were, how standards were set. 

There was some fantastic input from the group, I was lucky to work alongside some very talented people and I had the opportunity to present their work to the board of directors at a board meeting at Easter Road. 

Despite some good feedback on the presentation, there was little more said or done on "Winning the Hibernian Way" for some time, in fact the project had more or less been put to bed. I heard from Brian about a year later, to say that the club were looking to dust down the project and bring it to life, changes were afoot at the club that would mean they were in a position to make it work. 

Aside from a meet and greet meeting with Leeann Dempster on the day that a section of the Hibs support took to the West Stand car-park to protest against Rod Petrie, there was no further dialogue with the club about "Winning the Hibernian Way" and I had thought it had been forgotten about until I saw a comment from Hibs Chairman Rod Petrie in an interview around the time of the share issue, where he referenced the work (and the presentation!) that had been going on for some time. 

I like to think that this revival and feel good factor that is slowly but surely absorbing Hibernian has, in some way, stemmed from the work that group of people from Working Together spent months on, that even if it just planted a seed then that time was worthwhile. Even if it had nothing to do with that work, I think I'm fine believing it did, and that emotional investment makes the financial investment in the season ticket purchase all the more essential.