HIBERNIAN manager Lee Johnson has offered his full support to Marijan Cabraja following the death of Croatian left back’s father.
Cabraja, who moved to Easter Road from Dinamo Zagreb in the summer, has been given compassionate leave and is a doubtful starter for the cinch Premiership match against Rangers in Leith tomorrow.
Johnson stressed he will make a decision on whether the 25-year-old is capable of playing in the match against the Ibrox club when the defender returns to Scotland.
“Bless him, Marijan Cabraja's father passed away so obviously our well wishes go out to the whole family,” he said.
“We're looking forward to inviting him back into the Hibs family to give him a little bit love and care. That's been a difficult moment for us.
“He hasn't trained this week, but he wants to play. That's massive credit to him, but that decision will be down to me.
“It's a difficult one. Everybody's different in terms of the grieving time they need. Some cultures are different as well.
“Potentially, he could be on a flight tomorrow morning and back, but you've got to see what state he's in both mentally and emotionally, as well as physically in terms of the time he's missed training.
“It's a tough one as a manager. No-one teaches you those types of things on the pro licence. You've just got to be human about it and try and read the individual and see how he is, try and provide that bit of love, care and support that anybody would need in that situation.”
Johnson attended the first leg of the Champions League play-off between Rangers and PSV Eindhoven in Govan on Tuesday night – but he does not believe being in the middle of the double header will have a detrimental impact on the visitors at Easter Road tomorrow.
“It's a difficult one,” he said. “You'd think if there's £30 to £50 million riding on the midweek game that that probably becomes a big focus.
“But that's disrespectful in a sense to the players they've got in the squad, the depth of the squad. I think any Rangers side is going to be a good side.”
Johnson added: “We were disappointed with the Livingston game (Hibs lost 2-1 at Almondvale). We did do enough to at least draw that game. A few home truths were told at the end of the game because the standards weren't high enough.
“But we've had a really good training week. The team selection on Saturday will be really, really positive to go and take the game to Rangers.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel