I've been most heartened with some of the performances we've had so far – both collectively and some individually – which augurs well for the season ahead.

My one concern is despite creating a bucket load of chances in all three games we've only scored four goals. Mind you, three of those came from Colin Nish which now sees him sitting proudly atop the league of the SPL's top goalscorers. The new boots he got after the trip to Killie, which were dropped off to him by Gary Locke, are obviously working and, if he keeps his goal tally up throughout the next few months, Mr Locke might well be coming back through to Edinburgh to take those colourful boots back.

I know it's very early doors and, no disrespect to Kilmarnock, Falkirk or Inverness, but we could have faced much sterner opposition in this early part of the campaign. So here's hoping as the opposition toughens up, Hibs should be hitting the sort of form that we are seeing the signs of just now.

At Inverness on Saturday I think it's safe to say we were poor in the first half and this "never having scored a goal, let alone won" monkey was once again looming large.

I read an interview with John Rankin before the game who said he was hoping Hibs could score a goal and get all three points. Well, I suppose one out of two wasn't bad. But we got the goal and thankfully that part of that particular albatross was gone and, fingers crossed, next time we visit, we can finish the job.

And if you're a Hibs fan with a mobile phone, then chances are over the past week you'll have had a text from someone who heard from somebody else that they've been told on the quiet from someone who knows that Hibs are going to sign Derek Riordan on Monday/Tuesday/Wednesday (delete where applicable) at a press conference at Easter Road.

This all gathered pace at an alarming rate when Shaun Maloney's return to Parkhead was confirmed, although personally I failed to quite understand what difference that made.

We're now all aware that Hibs, along with a number of other clubs down south, did make an effort to get Deeks on loan and Celtic put the kibosh on that stating that they are only interested in selling him, which perhaps is fair enough. No question he'd come back to Hibs, but Celtic seem almost bloody minded in stopping him going anywhere.

But you do have to ask, if they have absolutely no plans to play him, doesn't it make sense to just let him go on loan? Celtic would save money on the wage bill and this in turn would get him playing and in the shop window – which could enable Celtic to command a much better fee than he would currently attract being stuck in reserves.

It's obvious that he and Mr Strachan may not be stepping out for a shandy together any time soon and this mutual disaffection for each other goes much further back than Derek's Sunday morning outburst in the Scotland on Sunday.

But you wouldn't like to think that in this day and age there was a deliberate attempt to halt this particular player's progress or career. You couldn't see anything like that happening here, could you? The longer this drags on, the more you might wonder.

But whether Derek is back playing in his favoured green and white this (or any) week remains to be seen. We've got two tough tests and both are at Easter Road. We've got Morton in the Cup tomorrow night and Motherwell come visiting on Saturday.

A big advantage for us is that we're playing at home and having enjoyed the atmosphere against Falkirk last weekend I hope we can build on that support and all watch some more cracking games of football – and two wins would be nice as well! No pressure.

Glory, Glory


I SPENT the best part of yesterday in the company of Craig Levein.

We joined up with rugby's Chris Paterson to make a short video to raise awareness for prostate cancer. It was a very enjoyable day which, despite its serious subject matter, generated a good bit of footballing banter between us.

I also got to see the cheeky side of Craig – in fact both of them! I only hope he's not smiling quite so much next time I see him, in the away dugout at Easter Road next month!