Hibs took a major step towards ensuring that the battle for second place and an easier route through the play-offs will go to the now infamous final round of matches as they eased past 10-man Livingston last night.

Hard as it is to know whether Hibs winning matches in April or sunglasses being a requisite at a Scottish football ground, those at Almondvale last night shared in a rare experience, but there was no doubt in Hibs boss Alan Stubbs about which was the important part of that.

"It was important to come here after the weekend and make sure we did it right and I thought we did that and I got the response I knew I was going to get off the players," he said.

"Tonight they could have easily felt sorry for themselves and had a little bit of a hangover but they tried to do the right things on what was a difficult surface."

An early opener, their instant response to a shock equaliser and getting to play the entire second half against short-handed opponents should all have ensured that this was not going to be another miserable evening for those who had recovered from Saturday's Hampden disappointment and made this shorter trip west to be among the 2301 in attendance.

However this had been a treacherous proposition against a team which may sit bottom of the Championship table, but has gone unbeaten in five matches and won a trophy in a month's play that has seen Hibs win just twice in six matches.

Stubbs made something of a statement by selecting all those of the losing Scottish Cup semi-final team that he could and the only absentee, Saturday's man-of-the-match Scott Allan, most assuredly would have had he not been suspended, offering others the chance to impose themselves.

In seeking to do so they crafted their opening, tension relieving goal with an ease that could hardly have contrasted more with how they toiled, at times unluckily but also for long periods ineffectively, to turn pressure into goals at Hampden four days earlier as Jordan Forster lifted the ball into the box for Scott Robertson to run onto and strike it first time right-footed past Darren Jamieson from 16 yards out.

It could not be that straightforward, though and they conceded an equaliser in soft fashion when Bradley Donaldson's long ball from close to halfway on the right, well weighted but essentially speculative, should have been dealt with. Paul Hanlon got caught under it,however, could not retreat quickly enough and after it bounced into his path Myles Hippolytes met it sweetly with his left foot to lash in a volley that Mark Oxley had no chance of stopping as it flashed across him.

There was a captain's determination about the way Liam Fontaine almost immediately sought to take charge in setting up Hibs second goal within two minutes.

Collecting the ball in an advanced position inside the Livingston half on the left the central defender drove forward before he fired it low into the box. In among a cluster of players Jason Cummings got a first shot in which was blocked but when it rebounded to him just beyond the penalty spot, he had time to steady himself before picking his spot to Jamieson's right.

A one goal advantage remained fragile, not least since there was still a looseness to some of Hibs' defending, but looked rather less so when Livi defender Darren Cole was rightly sent off just before the interval after diving wildly into a challenge on Cummings.

It could have been a straight red, but he was shown a second yellow having ironically, in light of recent events, been booked earlier for blocking a cross with his hand, an incident referee Andrew Dallas appeared to miss before being helped out by his assistant, who in turn may have got it wrong because the contact seemed to happen inside the box.

Even against 10 men it was not to be plain sailing Danny Mullen testing Oxley wqith both a low cross and a fierce shot before they were gifted the chance to wrap things up when Kyle Jacobs brought Dylan McGeouch down in the penalty area, albeit Mark Burchill, Livingston's manager, claimed Dallas subsequently admitted to him that he had erred in giving it.

He opted to take the spot kick himself and struck it solidly enough but Jamieson guessed right in heading in every sense to turn the ball away.

Thereafter it was largely one way traffic by the time Fraser Fyvie sent replacement Dominique Malonga away on the left that took, racing into the box before pirouetting to shake off Scott Pittman and slide the ball right-footed past Jamieson to calm any remaining nerves.