Hibernian manager David Gray admitted he was facing an anxious sweat over the fitness of star man Nicky Cadden, as he revealed the wingback was forced off in the defeat against Celtic with a hamstring issue.
Cadden went down clutching his leg during the first half after playing a backpass to Hibs goalkeeper Jordan Smith, being replaced immediately by Jordan Obita, and Gray is hoping that the initial fears over the severity of his injury prove to be unfounded with just nine games left of the league season.
"We don't know the significance of it yet,” Gray said.
“It's a hamstring, his hamstring just tightened up. The one positive is he walked off the pitch, so that's a good thing. But it's far too early to determine the significance of it. We'll find out where we are.”
Cadden’s twin brother Chris was also struggling with a knock late on in the game, but Gray thinks his issue may only be a minor one.
“It's more of an impact, Chris, right at the end,” he said.
“I think the two players came together in that tackle. Hopefully that's nothing too significant either.
“At that point of the game, we'd used our subs, we'd threw everything at it to try and get back into the cup tie.
“He took a bit of a blow and hopefully it's just an impact injury that should settle now.”
While disappointed with the outcome from the game at Celtic Park that brought Hibs’ 15-match unbeaten run to end, Gray remains upbeat about the opportunity that his side have given themselves over the closing stretch after recovering from their horror start to the season.
And he points to the huge support that followed Hibs through to Glasgow as evidence that the club are in a good place at the moment both on and off the pitch.
"I'll never accept losing games in football at all,” he said.
“But it's also the toughest test in Scottish football. The last time we lost a game of football was here. It was always going to be a difficult day, but as I said, I can't fault the players' effort. We're not going to come away from how far we came in a short period of time.
“So we need to dust ourselves down quickly and the attention will quickly change towards a league form now, which is all we can really do.
“I think that's two defeats in 19. It's always a difficult place to come. It certainly wasn't going to get any easier because we'd won at Easter Road previously. A lot was made of that and I think the expectation and a little bit of the belief that's starting to grow within the football club.
“We had 7,000 supporters coming through here today, that were outstanding for 90 plus minutes, that shows how far this team's come, the group's come.
“We've been through a lot, but we're certainly going in the right direction. The frustration from my point of view when you lose games of football is, could we have been better in the game? Yes, I think in position we could have been a lot better, but I can't take anything away from the players in terms of what they've given me over the piece and the effort put into the game.
"That connection [with the fans], I've always felt it. I've been fortunate enough to be in this club for a very long time, they’re so supportive.
“They've been through tough times, had many highs with them as well, but it shows where we are right now.
“The 7,000 coming through, I've already touched on that and we're going to need them to be right there, right to the very end of the season, because the league campaign.
“There's still absolutely everything to play for.”
