Tam McManus warns Hibs boss Nick Montgomery he must sort defence out or risk trip back to horror days of 2003

Waching Hibs right now takes me back 20 years to the time our leaky defence turned the normally cool-headed Bobby Williamson into prime ranting, raving, boot-launching Alex Ferguson.

Honestly the forwards at Easter Road must be tearing their hair out with what’s going on at the back. It’s not even taken 90 minutes for Nick Montgomery to see exactly what needs sorting after shoddy defending cost him the perfect start as boss at Kilmarnock on Saturday. Two up and coasting with 30 minutes to go only to concede twice and end up wondering how three points turned into one. It’s nothing new for Hibs fans of a certain age.

As a striker in the 2002-03 team that scored goals for fun and chucked them in just as joyfully, life was never dull. The New Year derby at Tynecastle brought it all to a head - with poor Yannick Zambernardi lucky his was still attached by the time we left Gorgie.

Incredibly we were 4-2 up going into injury time at the home of our fiercest rivals and ended up drawing 4-4. I’d scored my first derby goal and was subbed late on as we edged towards a monumental win.

Of course I was giving it big licks and remember sitting on the bench planning a night out to end all night outs in the capital. Bobby hadn’t won a derby at that point and was a few minutes away from breaking that curse in our rivals’ back yard at New Year. It doesn’t get any better than that.

Then Zambernardi, our French left back, took matters into his own hands with two moments right out of primary school football’s ‘how not to defend’ handbook. The equaliser, with just seconds left, was the worst as Yannick got the ball out wide and punted it straight to their keeper instead of taking it into the corner to run down the clock.

I remember Bobby