Stubbs: League Cup run will give players "belief" in Edinburgh derby
Manager Alan Stubbs believes Hibernian's thrilling League Cup run will give his players added belief against Hearts in their William Hill Scottish Cup clash at Tynecastle on Sunday.
The Leith side, sitting second in the Championship behind Rangers, beat Ladbrokes Premiership sides Aberdeen, Dundee United and St Johnstone on their way to a League Cup final meeting with Ross County at Hampden next month.
Stubbs, who revealed midfielder Fraser Fyvie will be out for three or four weeks'' with a slight medial ligament injury, is hoping the confidence taken from those results will have a positive impact in their keenly-awaited fifth-round tie against their Edinburgh rivals, who are sitting third in the top flight.
I don't think it will do any harm to the players,'' he told Press Association Sport.
They will take confidence from the St Johnstone win, the Dundee United win and the Aberdeen win.
If they needed any consolidation or any belief that they are good enough to play against Premiership opposition then they would have got that from those games.
But this is different now. On Sunday there are other things that make it more difficult.
The fact that it is a derby, we are away from home at Tynecastle so if they are going to come through on Sunday they will certainly have earned it.''
Stubbs is hoping that Sunday night will see Hibs remain in with the chance of what would be a unique domestic treble,
The former Bolton, Celtic and Everton defender said: We are in three competitions and if people want me to say we have no chance then I have said all along, they are speaking to the wrong person.
We are in three and while we are in three we will try to progress as far as we can in all of them.
We have managed to get ourselves to a final and we have an opportunity on Sunday, albeit a difficult one, to progress in the Scottish Cup.
And as long as we keep doing that then we will keep having a better chance of winning silverware.
But in order to keep going we will have to perform very well on Sunday, there is no doubt about that.''
While Fyvie is definitely out, Stubbs is hoping centre-back Liam Fontaine, who went off in the 1-0 midweek win at Morton with a tight hamstring, proves his fitness.
He said: Fraser will be out, he has a slight medial ligament injury which will keep him out for three or four weeks probably.
It is a blow but we have a really strong squad and Fraser was out of the team earlier in the season through suspension and because I chose different things and we managed to win games of football then.
So yes, he has done really well recently and he will be a miss but it is an opportunity for someone else.
Fonts (Fontaine) will know more tomorrow. He was out running and if there is no reaction we will look to progress him and if that is the case he has a good chance of featuring.''