Hibs are lucky to have their star striking partnership, according to Easter Road director Fife Hyland.

Garry O’Connor and Leigh Griffiths put Aberdeen to the sword at Hampden to book the Hibees a date with destiny in the all-Edinburgh cup final next month.

The future of Wolves loanee Griffiths was cast into doubt in March when newspaper reports suggested he had a bust up with manager Pat Fenlon and his assistant Billy Brown at training.

The alleged scuffle was categorically denied by the club and Griffiths has since gone on to net in a crucial victory over Inverness, as well as his Hampden moment on Saturday.

Remarking on the incident, and praising the 21-year-old’s contribution at Hibernian, Hyland said: “There’s incidents at training grounds all over Scotland, players are training at such high intensity you’d be surprised if there weren’t.

“Leigh loves being at Hibs and all he wants to do is score for Hibs, like his strike partner Garry O’Connor.

“We’re lucky to have them here and we saw on Saturday that they were the difference between the teams.”

Hyland took the chance to praise Pat Fenlon who has taken the club to the final despite only arriving half-way through the season.

Managing director Hyland, who has announced he will leave the club in the summer, said Fenlon has instilled a winning mentality that could lead Hibs safely away from relegation trouble.

Hyland said: “He’s changed the culture, he’s changed the majority of the squad in one transfer window and they’ve performed fantastically well.

“He’s created a real unit amongst the team and around the club  and he’s put a real winning mentality together which is why he was appointed. He’s a winner.

“We’re only focused on the league just now, then on the cup. We’ll talk about the future of players after that.

“As ever Pat will be given every resource we’ve got to help build his team. This is a real opportunity for him to build something over a longer transfer window to construct a squad to compete next year.”