The Scotland hitman who now has a 'cool thing' against his name and knows how 6ft 4in body works

Considerable satisfaction has been gleaned, not least from scoring his first Premier League goals for the doomed Ipswich Town. One of them was the equaliser in the recent 2-2 draw with Everton. It meant there was something riding on it for Hirst last weekend when Everton played Southampton, which is strange considering he plays for Ipswich and they were away at Leicester City on the same afternoon.

Afterwards, Hirst checked the score: Southampton had drawn a blank. His status as the last man to score a goal against Everton at the Grand Old Lady was assured. Remember the name, as they say, as it could come in handy on quiz night at the Dog & Duck.

And it’s George not David Hirst, the father he's on the brink of emulating when it comes to international caps (it’s just that the son’s will be with Scotland rather than England). And neither is it “Geoff”, as he’s been dubbed by John McGinn (surprise, surprise) in recognition of his England background.

Hirst Junior represented England in four different age groups before switching to Scotland earlier this year and winning his first caps in the Nations League play-off against Greece. He will make his third appearance if he features against Iceland in next month’s friendly, which will equal the number of times his father played for England in the early 1990s.

Fingers crossed for Southampton

Hirst could win his fourth cap v Liechtenstein few days later, when he will have another chance to open his goal account for Scotland – if he hasn’t already. His father scored once for England v New Zealand. The prolific Hirst Senior also scored at Goodison Park for Sheffield Wednesday but not one as meaningful as his son managed with a far post header three weekends ago. “Someone actually mentioned it to me straight after we played Everton,” Hirst jnr says. “I just had both fingers crossed that no-one from the Southampton team scored last weekend.

"I thought it was pretty cool, to be honest. In ten years’ time it’ll be a pretty cool quiz question that I'm sure nobody will know the answer to. I thought it was a pretty cool thing to have against your name.”

It was on the coach back to Ipswich when he was alerted to the potential significance. “We realised that it was the second to last game and I might be the last person to score there,” he recalls. “Someone said that to me and obviously Everton won at the weekend and I’ve been the last away player…

“You think of old school English football and I'm sure Goodison is one of those grounds that pops into pretty much everybody's heads in the Premier League and whatnot. It was nice to do it at a stadium like that with all the history that it's got and them moving to a new stadium. Hopefully I can go and play there at some point as well and score a couple of goals there…”

Unless sent there courtesy of a kind (or, indeed, unkind) cup draw, he won’t get the chance to score at the Hill Dickinson Stadium next season, sadly. Ipswich have long since seemed condemned for a quick return to the Championship, something that was confirmed at the end of last month following a 3-0 defeat to Newcastle United. Hirst can see some upsides from an exacting campaign at his club, including understanding both his body and mind better.

“It's a season everybody, I believe, has improved as a player,” he says. “We didn't manage to stay up but if you've got 25 lads who, individually, have all improved, then you go into next season in pretty good shape. Personally, for me, I think I'm at a position now where I'm 26 and I feel like I've finally found how my body works at 6ft 4in.”

He has also reached a better accord with his inner self. It’s not hugely surprising to hear that staying off social media is something he’s found beneficial. “(I am) Not checking what people were saying…that’s what I used to do,” he says. “I don’t do it as much and when I do it doesn’t bother me. It’s about being as self aware as you can, where am I in relation to where I want to be? Am I at my peak, can I get better?....If you are honest with yourself then when things aren’t going right you can look in the mirror and say it’s nobody else’s fault.”

There’s a very different person now looking back when he examines himself although a recent switch to blond hair might have something to do with that. “That was a spur of the moment thing,” he explains, via a Zoom interview. “I got highlights in my head six months ago and went to get it done again. The girl doing my hair said it wasn’t long enough so I decided to do the whole lot! I hadn’t gone all that way to not get anything done.”

It's something else for which he can expect to be teased when he reunites with his new Scotland teammates, although he welcomes the banter as it has helped smooth the transition between playing for England and Scotland (he qualifies because of his paternal grandfather). “

"There was no weirdness, or anything like that,” he says. “It did not take much time. Straightaway when you walk in and John McGinn is calling me 'Geoff' it is probably a bit of a nice ice-breaker.” A first international goal, which is surely pending, can only assist with this settling-in process.