A Sauzee glow as O’Connor grows up

THE only sack Franck Sauzee headed for last night was the bed in his city-centre home. After a week in which it was reported that defeat by Celtic would result in his dismissal, the Hibs manager responded by inspiring a powerful performance that forced the champions to drop points for only the third time this season. He must have enjoyed a good night's sleep.

Although Sauzee still hasn't won a league match since he took over seven weeks ago, he admitted that denying Celtic the three points, something
only Livingston and Aberdeen had achieved already this
season, felt like a victory. "My players were wonderful," he said. "I would like to think that this is a new start for us."

It is certainly a new start for 18-year-old Garry O'Connor. He gave Hibs the lead with his first goal for the club in a first half in which Hibs seemed to be slicing open their opponents with uncharacterictic ease. "We didn't show them too much respect," said Sauzee. "We were composed and played our own game." Their dominance had an unsettling effect on at least one of Celtic's players.

Midway through that opening period, Hibs defender Paul Fenwick went down in the box and had to be treated for a head knock. Although the incident was missed by most of those in the ground, including referee Alan Freeland, television pictures later confirmed that Bobo Balde had felled the Canadian with a forearm smash.

Sauzee said that the Celtic defender ought to have been red-carded, but stopped short of demanding that the Scottish Football Association take action by analysing video evidence. "The game has finished now," said the Frenchman. "He didn't kill anyone." Needless to say, Martin O'Neill was looking in the other direction when the incident occurred.

Having started the match in the same sluggish fashion that enabled Livingston to take an early lead in midweek, Celtic hit back with the kind of response that has become their trademark. Although they had only a John Hartson equaliser to show for their efforts, O'Neill was not discouraged by a day on which their lead over Rangers was cut to 13 points. "We have played two difficult away games in the space of three days and taken four points," said the manager. "I'm really pleased. We were still trying to win it in the last couple of minutes."

O'Neill revealed that Didier Agathe, who was not risked at Easter Road, could make his comeback against Rangers in Tuesday's CIS Cup semi-final at Hampden. Stilian Petrov, too, will be fit to play. Sauzee, meanwhile, is heading into a semi-final against Ayr with a boost to his morale of which no team talk would be capable.

It is a welcome pick-me-up at a time when his cause has not been helped by a lengthy list of absentees. John O'Neil, Ulrik Laursen, Tam McManus and Craig Brewster missed this one through injury, while Alen Orman and Matthias Jack were suspended. It prompted him to trust in youth and thrust a spine of remarkable inexperience up against the Scottish champions.

Short-term signing Gary Caldwell, whose appearances for Newcastle were as rare as Celtic losses, was composed in a central defensive trio, Finnish midfielder Jarkko Wiss did a fine job policing the roaming Lubo Moravcik and O'Connor partnered Paco Luna up front. It didn't take the young Scot long to repay Sauzee's faith in him.

With only five minutes gone he was darting in at the near post and failing only by the width of his bootlace to turn a low cross by Ulises De la Cruz beyond Robert Douglas. It was an instructive warning for Celtic. Seventeen minutes later the 18-year-old striker was tearing off towards the dugout in celebration of a goal that Hibs' first-half dominance deserved.

Grant Brebner couldn't have been hoping for much when he hurled a free-kick high towards the back post and saw the burly figure of John Hartson rise to meet it. But the striker seemed distracted either by the glare of the floodlights or by speculation in the papers linking him with a move to Middlesbrough when he plonked a half-hearted clearing header back into the danger area.

O'Connor, striding on to the ball with the gusto of a man yet to score for his club, lashed it low into the bottom corner with his left foot.

Wiss, too, might have scored his first goal for Hibs had it not been for an alert tip over by Douglas. There was another cross by the rampant De la Cruz, another feeble clearance, this time by Bobby Petta, and a piercing effort ripped goalwards by the ex-Stockport man deserving of more than a corner.

Stephen Crainey was deputising at the back for the injured Joos Valgaeren, but it would be harsh to lay the blame for Celtic's new-found defensive frailties at his door. O'Neill's side were simply slow out of the blocks for the second time in three days. Not until the stroke of half-time did they effect a significant effort on goal, Henrik Larsson's header clearing the bar after a Moravcik corner.

How Sauzee, who has repeatedly accused his team of being too soft, must have despaired to see them unravel 45 minutes of sterling work in one moment of slackness. Gary Smith's lapse five minutes after the break invited Moravcik to deliver a cross that Hartson headed beyond Nick Colgan. His marker, Paul Fenwick, looked as though he was still dazed by his first-half altercation with Balde. The timing of the equaliser was galling for Hibs. They might have assumed an unassailable lead two minutes earlier had Paco Luna, sent clear by captain and man-of-the-match Grant Brebner, not failed to chip Douglas.

Hibs weren't nearly so incisive in the second half, but they proved resilient in the face of a strengthening Celtic challenge. O'Neill replaced Moravcik with Shaun Maloney and Bobby Petta with Steve Guppy, but scoring chances were few. The best fell to Hartson who blasted an angled shot off Colgan's legs.

Taken from the Scotsman