Hibs boss David Gray reveals plan for club record signing Thibault Klidje after loan exit
Togo international joins Danish side for rest of the season
Hibs head coach David Gray has stressed Thibault Klidje can still have a long-term future at Easter Road despite his shock deadline-day move.
The capital club’s record signing joined Randers on loan with the Danish side negotiating an option to buy the Togo international striker as part of the deal.
Klidje only joined Hibs last summer from Luzern for a seven-figure fee.
The 24-year-old has netted four goals and most of his 26 appearances have come off the bench.
Gray said: “I took my time with him, settling him in. That took a bit of time, culturally and everything else, and not putting too much pressure on Thibault too early. That’s not changed in our mindset.
“He has had a few setbacks with injury and illness and that game time hasn’t been as regular as he would have liked probably, and for everybody involved, to be honest.
“This is a good opportunity for him between now and the end of the season to go and maximise that at a very good level : go and get a bank of games under his belt where he can go and be that out and out nine that we know he can be.
“We will keep an eye on him and at the end of the season he will come back in a much better place, I’m sure. He will massively benefit from that regular football at a very good level.
“When you talk about the option, that’s something that is quite common, for teams to protect themselves a little bit. That has to work for everybody involved.
“But my focus for him is to come back in as good a shape as possible with confidence levels as high as he can, and that would be the aim until someone wants to do something different.”
Gray had a busy deadline day with Dylan Levitt and Junior Hoilett also moving on and three new players arriving.
Hibs signed right-back Felix Passlack from Bochum and versatile attacker Ante Suto from Croatian side Slaven Belupo on permanent deals, while Zimbabwe centre-back Munashe Garananga joined on loan from FC Copenhagen.
They added to the earlier arrivals of Irish winger Owen Elding and loan players Dane Scarlett and Kai Andrews.
Gray, whose team host Dundee United in the William Hill Premiership on Wednesday, said: “I’m really happy with where we are, we have even seen that with the new additions when they came on in the Rangers game, they added an energy and freshness.
“The new additions again in the last 24 hours all trained and added that freshness again.”
Comments
Want to join the conversation? Please or to comment on this article.