Petrie is an easy target but he’s improved the club massively, insists Jones
BACK in Rob Jones’ time at Easter Road a 5-1 cup final scoreline was something to crow about. Scorer of the first goal in the club’s triumph over Kilmarnock in 2007, Jones enjoyed the perfect Hampden occasion as he lifted the League Cup trophy aloft.
The success remains Hibs’ last piece of glory and defeat to Hearts by the same margin in the 2012 Scottish Cup Final has been symptomatic of a downward turn that has taken the club to the brink of relegation.
Jones, who’s been at Largs over the past week on an SFA coaching course, was at Hamilton to watch Hibs win the first leg of their play-off 2-0 and soothe fears of demotion to Championship.
The support present at New Douglas Park was wholeheartedly behind their team but there remains a strong undercurrent of dissatisfaction with manager Terry Butcher and, especially, chairman Rod Petrie.
Jones, who deferentially refers to the latter as ‘Mr Chairman’, has retained a strong bond with his former employer since departing five years ago and urges the fanbase to be careful what they wish for.
‘What Mr Chairman has done for the club has been terrific,’ said Jones, currently in a player/coach role with Doncaster Rovers. ‘I know people out there would like him to loosen the purse strings but he is in charge and he doesn’t do what’s best for him — he makes decisions for the benefit of the football club.
‘The club has moved forward massively since I left. They are on a very good footing, they have a terrific training ground and the new stand brings more people through the turnstiles.
‘Someone always has to take the blame and at Hibs nine times out of 10 it’s Mr Chairman.’
It was Tony Mowbray who brought Jones to a Hibs team full of precocious talent including Scott Brown, Steven Fletcher and Kevin Thomson.
‘Times have changed and players come and go,’ reflected Jones. ‘I think there’s only Lewis Stevenson left from my time and Kevin Thomson has come back.
‘The side we had at that time was terrific — in today’s league you’d say second was a given with that team.
‘When you try to reflect on what has happened, it can be a
hard pill to swallow.’
Victory over Hamilton was only the second achieved by Butcher in 20 matches, a miserable run pieced together by a thoroughly miserable-looking group of players.
Stories emerged of a resistance to the oldschool methods of Butcher and his assistant Maurice Malpas. Despite this, there has been no blatant revolt and certainly nothing to rival the events of six years ago when Jones led a players’ delegation which arrived on Mr Chairman’s doorstep to complain about the working practices of John Collins just weeks after the former Scotland midfielder had led the club to cup victory.
‘Me being the way I am I don’t regret things,’ he reflected. ‘If I went back and it happened again would it be different? Yes, it would. But I had to come through it to realise that.
‘I welcomed the appointment of Terry Butcher, he is a very good and experienced manager. He is definitely the man for the job. Mr Butcher, first and foremost has to keep them in the division and then he has to create his squad and his team in the summer.’