1982-83 : Stanton Takes Over
The season opened with the Tom Hart Trophy, played in front
of an Easter Road crowd of 10,000 in memory of the late Chairman. It
was a sign of things to come that we struggled to a 1-0 win over the First-Division
Jambos, with Jackie McNamara getting the only goal of the game in the last
minute. The improving Tynecastle side included Henry Smith, Sandy Jardine,
and ex-Hibee Peter Marinello.
The League Cup was still played in groups of four (just like
the Champions League, eh no?) and our first game was at home to Rangers.
The game itself - with Gordon Rae equalising a goal by our favourite John
MacDonald - was less memorable than the pelting of Bluenose manager John
Greig with pies from the standing enclosure in front of the old stand.
In fact the pie incident just about turned out to be the
high point of this tournament for 
Bertie and his boys. Out of the six games, only one win - away to Clydebank
- was followed by a pointlessly defensive 0-0 draw at Ibrox and a 3-1 defeat
at Airdrie, with the first goal being conceded to ex-Hibby Colin Campbell.
The miserable League Cup performances were enough not only to turn the faithful
Scotsman journos against Auld (see cuttings) : they also gave new chairman
Kenny Waugh the excuse he needed to show him the door, along with assistant
Pat Quinn and coach John Lambie, before the Premier League campaign got under
way. Waugh let it be known that he had never been in favour of Auld's
tactics anyway.
Pat Stanton can't have been too hard to convince to make
the trip home from East End Park to Easter Road. His relative lack
of experience in management didn't deter Waugh from approaching the legend.
The savings to be made from the outgoing management team's share of the wage
bill had to be a factor too. It was certainly a challenge for Pat,
and his assistants Jimmy O'Rourke and George Stewart, but what was guaranteed
was that they would have the support of the fans.
The opening game was at home to St Mirren, and the free-flowing
attacking play from Hibs was like a breath of fresh air to the gasping fans.
OK, so we didn't manage to score, but only an inspired performance from Billy
Thomson in the Saints' goal denied us as the shots rained in from Alan Sneddon,
Gary Murray, Ralph Callachan, Erich Shaedler and yes, even Benny Brazil.
However, things went downhill after this promising(-ish) opening. Two more draws and three back-to-back defeats left Hibs in 9th position, and already facing a relegation 4-pointer at home to Jock Wallace's promoted Motherwell side. They had already let in 17 goals in their opening 6 games, but we had only scored three, and the worried fans had to endure 69 minutes of nervy, disjointed football at a dreich Easter Road before Gordon Rae finally found a way past their leaky rearguard with a 20-yard daisy cutter. Our first win after 7 games, and the relief was immense.
The Hibees weren't out of the woods yet though. Scoring remained a problem, and with injuries and suspensions in defence, a lot of pressure landed on Jim McArthur in goal, as the need to close the door at the back grew desperate. Gordon Rae was pulled back into defence, and was still learning the job. After 12 games, a third of the way through the season, we had earned just 7 points.
And so it was, back in 9th place and on course for a relegation-clinching
21-point total, that the club signed Alan Rough
from Partick Thistle. Looking back on the stats, it looks like Roughy
saved us from an early return to the First Division. After only one
clean sheet in the last 9 games before his arrival, he managed five in his
first 9. With his help, Hibs averaged nearly a point per game, which
guaranteed safety in the days before 3 points for a win. All Stanton
needed now was to find a regular goalscorer, and Hibs could maybe think next
season about the top half of the table. Well, we could but dream...
As for the remainder of this season, our second win didn't
come until our next game against Motherwell, a week before Christmas.
After the turn of the year we managed a 1-0 victory at Dens Park, and home-and-away
doubles against the relegated part-timers of Morton and Kilmarnock.
Our best result of the season was the 8-1 drubbing of the Ayrshire side at
Easter Road on 2nd April - Hibs' best ever score in the Premier League, if
I'm not mistaken. It was a lovely sunny day, and Killie just fell to
pieces in the 2nd half.
A week before the demolition of Kilmarnock, we managed a
3-3 draw at Tannadice. This was a fine result in itself, given that
the Arabs were on their way to winning the title. The most memorable
thing about it was Brian Rice's late
volley which earned us a share of the points, and started Archie MacPherson
on a campaign of hype that must've put some pressure on the youngster, until
he eventually moved south to Nottingham Forest.
After bursting into life with those eleven goals in two games, the side never looked back (i.e. they forgot all about how to score) and in the last 7 games amassed a further - ermm - two goals. Graeme Harvey, signed from Ormiston Primrose, no less, did score once on his debut against Morton, but that was it. More significantly, Willie Irvine (one of Stanton's first signings) scored his first goal, and the only goal, in a friendly against Swansea City (then English First Division) in February. In another friendly match the same month, Sunderland won 2-1 at Easter Road, through goals by Ally McCoist (who wasn't getting a regular game - shame!) and Gordon Chisholm, who would be back a few years later...
Scottish Premier League Table 1982-83
Pld W D L F A Pts
1 Dundee Utd 36 24 8
4 90 35 56
2 Celtic 36
25 5 6 90 36 55
3 Aberdeen 36 25
5 6 76 24 55
4 Rangers 36
13 12 11 52 41 38
5 St Mirren 36 11 12 13
47 51 34
6 Dundee 36
9 11 16 42 53 29
7 HIBERNIAN 36
7 15 14 35 51 29
8 Motherwell 36 11 5
20 39 73 27
9 Morton 36
6 8 22 30 74 20
10 Kilmarnock 36 3 11 22
28 91 17
Other notable pictures from season 82/83: Jim Duffy played
for that Morton team, but after they were relegated he was snapped up by
Dundee, where it took some time for a knee injury to end his career.
See if you can recognise him under that mop of hair. Another sight
sadly all too rare these days - the brand new, empty, echoing stands at Ibrox,
as "Best Ever Ranger" John Greig plunged his side into mid-table obscurity,
just 4 points ahead of St Mirren.
Our cup run that season amounted to a 4-1 home defeat to Aberdeen, so enough said about that, except that it was the same Dons side that lifted the European Cup Winners' Cup that season.
As a footnote, Hearts won promotion at the second time
of asking, as runners up to St Johnstone. The message from the Hibbies
was: "Welcome back Hearts - We need the points!"