Joe Newell admits Hibs humbling in Andorra WAS 'embarrassing' as he fronts up to fans pelters

Hurting Hibs star Joe Newell admits Thursday’s 90-minute horror in Andorra was an “embarrassing night” for Lee Johnson’s side. But the midfielder, whose stoppage time free kick gives hope of a Conference League salvage job, insists there’s no way they can be as woeful in next week’s return in Leith.

Johnson and his players were slaughtered by the 200 travelling fans who had made the trek to the prinicipality to watch their side humbled 2-1 by minnows Inter Club d’Escaldes. The manager tried to diffuse the situation by calling for calm and later claimed embarrassing was too strong a word with the tie only at half-time. But Newell, who was first to emerge from the dressing room to speak to the media, blasted the performance as unacceptable and insists there are no excuses for one of the worst results in Hibs history.

He said: “It’s not acceptable. It’s an embarrassing night for us. We’ve had really good preparation coming into this first competitive game. We had a really good pre-season and have been looking forward to this.

“The club has built up this European venture we want to go on. But from the very start it wasn’t good enough. We didn’t set out the standard we want, never started with the intensity or style of play we want to play. From the get go it wasn’t good enough. We’re getting pelters walking off the pitch from the fans and rightly so.

“I imagine they’ve spent a good sum of money to come over here, so obviously we need to come out and say sorry to them. We know it’s absolutely not good enough. When the dust settles it’s a bad loss. You can’t beat around the bush. It’s bad.

“But when the dust has settled and we analyse it, we had a few good chances in the second half and the goal has helped us to be in a