Tony Mowbray thanks Hibs as he reaches English Premiership

Ex Hibs boss Tony Mowbray has publicly thanked the club after he guided West Brom back to the Premiership.

The Baggies won promotion last week and then followed it up by securing the Coca Cola Championship title at the weekend.

West Brom recorded a 2-0 win over Queens Park Rangers on Sunday and secured a return to the English top flight.

The former Ipswich Town and Middlesbrough player spent two-and-a-half-years in charge at Easter Road and has thanked the club for allowing him to serve his apprenticeship in Edinburgh and the SPL.

Mowbray was speaking of his time in Edinburgh said:

"I will always be eternally grateful to Hibs for giving me the chance to become a boss in my own right.

"So many Hibs-minded people have been in touch since we won the league and that shows that I was able to build up a level of affection and respect.

"Believe me, the respect is mutual because the job I had there has influenced my time at West Brom.

"I went from being a coach in the background at Ipswich to manager at Hibs and that's when I began a steep learning curve, suddenly the buck stopped with me. The decisions could make or break me.

"I made many mistakes at Hibs, but those are the things that have shaped me in my job today.

"One of the things I learned at Easter Road was that psychology plays a huge part in modern-day football. When we took Hibs to Parkhead or Ibrox, we didn't go with fear - we went there with belief.

"We won at both grounds and there are parallels to be drawn between that Hibs side and my West Brom one.

"This team is stronger than Hibs but, with all respect to Rangers, the likes of Man Utd, Chelsea and Arsenal are a bit ahead of them."

Excellent comments from one of the best Hibs managers in the last 30 years.

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