Jamie McGrath reveals Hibs set-piece secret as deadball specialist leaves Rocky Bushiri seeing stars

Daily Record

3 days ago

The Republic of Ireland international has made an impressive start to life in Leith
It could be argued that Jamie McGrath 's dead-ball prowess should come with a health warning for both his team-mates and the opposition.
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The Hibs playmaker has already found the net with a stunning free-kick in the recent 1-1 Euro tie with Midtjylland in Denmark.
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And at the weekend he set up Rocky Bushiri for the opener in their 2-2 league draw with Kilmarnock.
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But that assist literally left Bushiri seeing stars as he headed McGrath's rocket into the back of the net at the back post.
It is those attributes that have helped the 28-year-old hit the ground running at Easter Road since his summer switch from Aberdeen.
And the Irishman is hoping he can contribute again as Hibs look to close out their Conference League third qualifying round tie with Partizan Belgrade on Thursday evening following last week's 2-0 victory in Serbia.
McGrath said: 'I've just been practising since I've been young. You're never ever going to get every one of them right, but you have to give yourself the best chance to do it.
'I know the keeper had a good save in the first leg from a shot I took from a free-kick.
'It's practice on the training pitch and as a team we do a lot of set-plays and it's something that we pride ourselves on.
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'We want to be the best in the league and it's a very important part of the game.
'As we've seen early on in the season, we've scored a lot of goals from set plays so far and it makes the job easier when you have lads like Rocky and Warren (O'Hora), Jack (Iredale) and Kieron (Bowie) in the box that are dying to get on the end of every ball.
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'For Rocky's at the weekend, I literally just put one across the box and Rocky got his nose on it and lucky enough it didn't do any damage!
'We were laughing, he didn't even see the ball go in the net. He just blacked out and the ball was in the net. But it's a very important part of the game.
'I'm really enjoying my football at the minute. I think all the boys are. We have started the season with some nice performances, although obviously disappointed not to get past Midtjylland [in the Europa League].'
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Hibs boss David Gray has demanded that his players approach the game thinking the tie is 0-0 as they look to record another victory over the Serbians.
With a 2-0 lead, Hibs could just try to protect what they've got but Gray has vowed they will not park the bus and McGrath is ready to carry out those orders.
The Irishman added: 'We can't get complacent or anything like that. The gaffer's made us well aware of that.
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'We can't go into the game thinking, oh, feet up or protect this two-goal lead. It's as if it's 0-0 and we have to try to win the game. He doesn't want us to be negative or take a step back and protect the lead.
'And I think that's important as well because once you start doing that, you can leave yourself open a bit more.
'Obviously now we'll be at home so we might maybe go at it a bit more on the front foot but it's going to be a very tough tie.'
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With Rangers having already negotiated their progress to the Champions League play-offs this week, both Hibs and Dundee United, who host Rapid Vienna this season following their 2-2 first leg, are looking to do the same to boost the feel-good factor around Scottish football.
And ex-Wigan and St Mirren man McGrath insists the encouraging results are a sign Scottish football is on the up.
He added: 'Since I even came here in 2020, I think the standard has gone right up. I see a lot more foreign players coming to the league as well.
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'I think it's great for Dundee United, for Scottish football, for as many teams as possible to get into the group stages because I've seen some stuff about the co-officiants.
'It's very important that as many teams as possible can try to get into the group stages because at the end of the day, it's good for Scottish football. It's two big games [for Hibs and United] and hopefully both of us can get through it.'
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Hibs boss Gray knows his team can rely on the backing of sell-out home support at Easter Road and would love his fans to replicate an atmosphere similar to what they experienced in Belgrade.
He said: 'We want to approach the game in a way that can get the crowd right behind us. That's something that we said the exact opposite going over there, can you quieten the crowd?
'Well, we tried! We did really well. Went two-nil up but the crowd was still very very loud for 90 odd minutes.
'The atmosphere and everything that came with that made it a special night to the point where you were speaking to some of the players on the plane on the way home and they came and said to me, 'Did you ever play an atmosphere like that?'
'I said it's the best one I've seen. I've been to Celtic Park and lot of them will have been to Tynecastle when you are getting booed and you're getting quite hostile atmospheres there.
'But they just couldn't believe the noise for as long as it was considering they were two-nil down, they didn't turn on their team at all.'