Hibs 2 Aberdeen 0

Hibs moved up into fifth place in the William Hill Premiership following a hard-fought 2-0 victory over Aberdeen.

The win extends our unbeaten run to ten games and closed the gap on today’s opponents to just two points.

Nectar Triantis put us ahead on 24 minutes as he notched his third goal in six matches and Nicky Cadden doubled our lead shortly after the interval with his fifth goal of the campaign.

The Hibees had chances to extend the lead before standing firm to late pressure from the visitors to claim three valuable points.

David Gray went with an unchanged starting XI following a 1-1 draw with Ross County in the Highlands.

The bench remained the same too whilst the contest came too soon for new signing, Alasana Manneh.

The previous time the team’s met in Leith, Aberdeen were within seconds of going top of the league before Rocky Bushiri’s dramatic late leveller.

That evening proved to be a turning point for both clubs this season and each has endured contrasting form since then.

Jimmy Thelin’s side had not won in the last 13 William Hill Premiership fixtures and he was in an unforgiving mood following their 3-0 loss at home to St Mirren a week prior.

The Dons boss reacted by dropping Sivert Nilsen and Slobodan Rubezic, with their places in the side taken up by Alfie Dorrington and Ante Palaversa.

The visitors carved out the first opportunity of the game when Leighton Clarkson turned Papa Gueye’s cut back goalward, only to fire his effort straight at Jordan Smith, who gathered comfortably.

There was little to write home about during a scrappy opening quarter-of-an-hour in this contest as both sides cancelled eachother out.

Aberdeen was targeting our right flank with Jeppe Okkels and Alexander Jensen looking to get in behind Chris Cadden and isolate Warren O’Hora.

We had our first real attack of note in the 23rd minute when Chris Cadden’s cross from the right found its way to Martin Boyle at the back post, his effort was blocked as was Nicky Cadden’s shot on the rebound, as Aberdeen – in their Wasps kit - swarmed their box to keep us out.

From the resultant corner kick, the deadlock was broken.  Nicky Cadden’s delivery was nodded back across goal by Josh Campbell and Nectar Triantis headed in from close range.

The Aussie has struck a rich vein of form in front of goal recently with today’s effort his third in his last six outings.

The first goal was always going to be crucial in this contest given we are unbeaten after scoring first at home this term and Aberdeen have not won after falling behind in the league all season. Momentum was in our favour.

In truth, the game then returned to its earlier pattern of play with little for either set of supporters to get excited about.

Nicky Cadden has been an instrumental player in our resurgence this term and after breaking his nose recently, he has been playing with a protective mask.

The winger appears to resemble a bearded Batman and after only three second half minutes he displayed some of the Caped Crusader’s traits as he stealthily got in at the back post to deliver the killer blow and head in our second goal of the afternoon.

His header, from twin brother Chris’ delivery, went in off the underside of the crossbar and although the effort was initially ruled out for offside, a (lengthy) VAR review saw it eventually awarded.

It was Nicky’s fifth goal this term and his third in consecutive matches against the Dons.

Aberdeen’s response was to make a triple change soon after with Peter Ambrose, Kevin Nisbet and Jack Mackenzie replacing Okkels, Topi Keskinen and Nicky Devlin.

Everyone inside Easter Road had their hearts in their mouth when referee Don Robertson was called to the monitor by VAR Kevin Clancy for a potential penalty kick to Aberdeen, following a challenge between Gueye and Rocky Bushiri.

After reviewing the footage, the referee deemed there had been no handball and no penalty for the visitors, with the decision going down well with the occupants in three of the four stands.

Perhaps looking to see the game out we withdrew Chris Cadden and Dylan Levitt, replacing the pair with Lewis Miller and Hyeokkyu Kwon for the closing stages.

With 17 minutes remaining, a clever threaded pass from Kieron Bowie through the legs of Kristers Tobers released Boyle clean through on goal; it was a big chance to kill the game and Aberdeen’s Ross Doohan came up with a big save to keep his side’s hopes alive.

From the resultant corner kick, Nicky Cadden’s floated delivery found Triantis rising highest at the back post however he was unable to keep his header down.

Both sides made further changes before Aberdeen wasted a gilt-edged opportunity to reduce arrears when Jensen’s low cross from the right found Nisbet eight yards out but, with the goal at his mercy, he poked a shot high over the crossbar.

Aberdeen to their credit kept going and were putting us under pressure as the game moved into nine additional minutes. In the first of those, Smith was called into action to save from an Ambrose header at his near post.

Tobers then headed wide from a Clarkson corner kick before we almost caught Aberdeen on the break with Kwon finding Bowie, he turned his marker before drawing a save from Doohan in goal.

Still Aberdeen pushed forward, and Smith was forced into a save from substitute Duk at his near post as he kept out the Dons to claim all three points and move up into fifth in the league table.