Hibs and the magical
On the first anniversary of Hibs’ first step towards finally lifting the Scottish Cup again, a 2-0 victory at Raith Rovers, it was fitting the trophy spent yesterday in Fife.
“It’ll never get a better backdrop than that,” one visitor to the Old Course in St Andrews suggests, reasonably, as inquisitive golf fans mingled with die-hard Hibs supporters in the queue to take photographs of the Scottish Cup. The handsome trophy formed a unique, and venerable, front two with the Claret Jug in a window above the golf museum, overlooking the ancient links.
The oldest domestic football trophy in the world, meet the oldest major golf trophy. “That’s the important one!” a slightly put-out sounding official at the R & A reminded those ignoring the strange jugshaped thing on a plinth next to the object of Hibs’ obsession for 114 years.
As another phone camera captured an image where the poor old Claret Jug was probably left on the fringes, if it was in the frame at all, a green and white scarf-wearing visitor replied: “You’ll never understand”.
No one can blame Hibs for squeezing the last drops from what most would have to agree was the greatest story told in Scottish football last year. Their so-called ‘Persevered’ tour is nearing its conclusion, with over 50,000 people having had the chances to pose with a trophy that Hibs are now preparing to hand back.
It must, to them, feel distressingly soon. It seems like almost yesterday when the last supporter was being ushered off the park at Hampden Park on 21 May. Indeed, Police Scotland were still making more arrests yesterday.
The cup has now been paraded at over 230 places, including hospices, church halls and primary schools. Up until yesterday, however, never the home of golf. Hibs chief executive Leeann Dempster wasn’t joking when she described the tour as “the most extensive of its kind in this country,” although how many other trophies have embarked on similar tours is a moot point. But this felt undeniably special. Yesterday saw the old trophy, still bedecked with green-and-white ribbons, of course, wend its way to the Old Course, where it enjoyed a date with the Claret Jug.
Positioned in the window of the café above the museum, both glinted alluringly in the winter sunshine as a surprising number of people filed past wearing suitably awed looks.
With just limited opportunities left to see the trophy on its own, never mind with such a historic golf trophy, yesterday proved popular.
Jaw-droppingly so in the case of Peter Hart, who probably isn’t the first person to come on a pilgrimage from Australia to the Old Course. But he hadn’t come to play a round of golf. He was here to see the Scottish Cup.
“We’ve come from Australia – a place called Albury – between Sydney and Melbourne,” he said. “I’m originally from Muirhouse in Edinburgh.
“It means everything to me,” he added. “If you could have seen me watching the cup final at The Charles Dickens in Melbourne, I was in tears. It was the best day of my life – it really was… until my grandson was born.
“I wanted to go and see the cup but I thought I was going to run out of opportunities. I thought I might have seen it on Friday at the game (v Dundee United) as I was in hospitality, but it was downstairs in the gallery.
“When I saw on the website it was here I thought ‘wow, what’s an hour’s drive from Edinburgh when you’ve come 12,000 miles already?’”
It was a surreal day in St Andrews had you happened to be a Hibs supporter dropping into the golf museum without prior knowledge of the Scottish Cup’s itinerary. Kevin Thomson, who played in last season’s run to glory, was standing chatting in a group. Over in the corner sat former winger Kevin Harper, offering his opinion to reporters on a variety of Hibs-related subjects. Harper was purring about Chris Humphrey, pictured, one of the players Hibs hope might help them achieve a remarkable Scottish Cup encore by retaining it. Of course, the harsh financial reality means promotion is probably now the preference, even for the most romantic Hibs fan.
Friday’s 3-0 win over Dundee United, in which Humphrey set up the first two goals