Hughes excited by strike options

Published: 07 Feb 2010 - 12:21:54

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Hughes added Alan Gow to his squad on Monday and the on-loan Plymouth forward marked his debut with a late strike after coming off the bench. Hibs were in the driving seat by half-time following Colin Nish's double, while Derek Riordan added a third moments before Chris Hegarty notched a memorable consolation strike. Substitute Abdessalam Benjelloun restored the hosts' three-goal cushion before Gow completed the scoring. Hughes has built a squad that he hopes can end the club's 108-year Scottish Cup drought and he is excited about the quality he can call on in the final third. He said: "There is plenty of cmpetition for places, real competition. I keep dangling that carrot and tell them to make sure they stay in the team with a man-of-the-match performance. "I'm delighted for all of them, not just Gow. We are obviously disappointed with the goal we lost but they possibly deserved that. "The goals were shared about as well so I'm delighted but it's not all about scoring goals, it's about doing it properly and doing it right." After seeing his lacklustre side pick up a 3-0 win over junior outfit Irvine Meadow in the previous round, Hughes could not fault their application against the lower-league outfit. He said: "Good on them, it was a good professional performance, we got an early goal and we could have scored more but that probably would have been harsh on them. "I thought Montrose were hard working and resolute. "These guys are the real heroes, guys that are part-time that have to go out and earn and living and play on a Saturday for a love of the game. "It was a good chance for them to take our scalp." Montrose manager Steven Tweed insisted there was no point in sending his Third Division team out to defend at Easter Road. He said: "It's all you can do, if we had sat back it would have been waves of attacks. "We could have played defensively but it would have been a matter of time before they broke us down. "I thought it was best to go out and have a go and that's what we tried. "Hibs have a lot of quality, you saw the substitutes that came off the bench, I look around and I have a couple of 16-year-olds."