Ross enourages Hibees men to take a leaf out of Mcinnes’ Dons book
Hibernian will today face an Aberdeen team buoyed by their 6- 0 Europa League thrashing of Faroese minnows, NSI Runavik.
It was the start of the Dons’ seventhsuccessive European campaign, and Easter Road boss Jack Ross is open and fulsome in his praise when it comes to his friendship with Pittodrie boss, Derek Mcinnes.
“Derek is someone who has been very, very good to me since I started managing,” said Ross
“Back when I was at Alloa, I had Scott Mckenna on loan for a brief period. Then when I went to St Mirren, I had Cammy Smith on loan.
“Derek spent a long time on the phone to me after I lost my job at Sunderland, because obviously he went through a similar experience with Bristol City.
“So he’s just somebody who, from a managerial point of view, has helped me.
“The longer you are at some place, that success maybe gets taken for granted.
“So I have the utmost respect for him. I enjoy competing against him, I enjoy coming up against his teams.”
Ross would like to see Hibs emulating Mcinnes’ Aberdeen by becoming a club that regularly competes for honours in Scotland.
“In terms of what they have done consistently, Aberdeen are the standard-bearers for that,” said Ross.
“To churn those results out yearafteryear – despite losing players and having to rebuild teams, and being relentless in qualifying for Europe and being in latter stages of cups – is outstanding.
“That’s what we need to strive for. Everyone believes were are a big club – because we are – but we need to back it up on the pitch.
“The challenge is to make sure we are consistently where we are now.
“To not just do this over a period of months or a season, but continually over several seasons.
Derek Mcinnes sent Scott Mckenna to Alloa under Jack Ross
“I can’t thumb my nose at the success others have had at Hibs, whether that is cups or finishing high up the league.
“But it’s about doing that time after time, and that becoming the culture at the club.
“We want to believe that we will finish in the top part of the league every year.”
The Hibees boss believes his men should never give up on the idea of winning the league title.
The Easter Road outfit have made a great start to the season and are unbeaten.
Challenging Celtic and Rangers for top spot is another thing altogether, but he believes it does no harm to set your sights high.
The key, according to the former St Mirren and Sunderland manager, is to start a campaign with the right mental approach.
He said: “I think it is hugely challenging for any team outwith the top two to compete with them because the resources are so vastly different.
“They are non- comparable in so many ways.
“But there’s nothing wrong with striving to do that. It’s how you frame it.
“So we spoke a lot before the season started, and wondered if I was to say to the players our objective is to win the league, would I get a buy-in from them all?
“I think if they all sat here in front of you, they would say no, they couldn’t buy into that.
“So we framed it a different way. We asked them what does a team that wins the league look like? What attributes do they have?
“And when the players listed those attributes, we asked them if could they achieve them?
“It’s a different way of looking at it. It’s the same thing, but in a different way.
“I think that’s what we have got to strive to do.
“I think it would be foolish to sit here and say, ‘Yeah, absolutely’ because, as I said, the resources are so different. But we should still strive to do it.”