'No pressure on Fletch to be new O'Connor'

TONY MOWBRAY today predicted that Steven Fletcher will become a prolific scorer for Hibs - but insisted there was no pressure on the 19-year-old to become "the new Garry O'Connor".

The departure of O'Connor to Lokomotiv Moscow allied to an injury to new signing Chris Killen has opened the door for Fletcher whose career, Mowbray admitted, is ahead of schedule.

The teenager's strike at Celtic Park took his tally to nine, just one short of his target for the season but Mowbray is adamant he won't be burdening the youngster with the expectation of being the club's top scorer. He said: "Ultimately in Steven's career he will be a prolific striker but we are not putting that pressure on him just now. He has done fantastically well to get to where he is but I'm not looking for him to be our main goal scorer or main striker.

"Hopefully we will be able to spread the goals around and hopefully Chris will be the man we would look to score goals rather than Steven.

"But having said that I am sure Steven will continue to score on a fairly regular basis."

Mowbray freely admits to protecting Fletcher from the rigours of being an out-and-out striker, the youngster often featuring in midfield rather than leading the line. He said: "We don't play him there often because he still has to develop physically. He has the size but not the strength of body to play against central defenders but, even so, he has scored nine goals from the areas we have played him in. He has a natural instinct to score goals."

Fletcher is approaching 70 first-team appearances for Hibs but Mowbray admitted that in different circumstances he probably wouldn't have featured so often.

He said: "Steven has played more games than he probably would have had everyone been fit and available. Last season, being so young, he found it difficult to play three, four or five games on the bounce but that was probably more to do with the mental aspect of the game.

"So, in the past, we have given him a break then put him back in but there is no questioning his talent or the contribution he has made this season - he's moving forward.

"What he has achieved is no surprise to anyone in this club. We see him in training every day and the rest of the players don't see him as a young boy but as one of them and rightly so because he is a special talent."

Meanwhile, four former Hibs players and the families of two more will be formally presented with Scotland international caps at the club's annual awards dinner a week on Sunday.

The SFA changed the rules to award retrospective caps to players who were denied that honour and so Alex Cropley, Des Bremner, Jim Scott and Neil Martin will receive their caps along with members of the families of Willie Hamilton and Erich Schaedler.

Taken from the Scotsman