He is on the back of a derby hammering from Hearts, he’s got an injury list like a phone book and his two best players missed training on Friday to thrash out deals with other clubs.
To top it all off, everyone and their granny is billing today’s clash between Hibs and Aberdeen as El Sackico, a managerial Battle Royale with the loser facing he prospect of being handed their p45. Lee Johnson should have had the weight of the world on his shoulders at Tranent yesterday but – in stark contrast to Jim Goodwin at Pittodrie – instead he wore a grin and a shrug. The Hibs gaffer did a good impression of the Monty Python Black Knight, dismissing limbs being hacked off as mere flesh wounds.
Perhaps the news Kevin Nisbet’s proposed move to Millwall was hitting the skids helped improve his mood. But even if the striker’s transfer did go through, Johnson was not going to wallow in self-pity.
He’s been there and done it in this managerial game and even this backdrop of impending doom won’t distract him from trying to overcome the constant challenges in his path. Johnston said: “I’m not moaning, There’s no violin playing from me. We have got to go out and put on a strong and positive Hibs performance.
"All I can promise you is that I'm doing a really honest job for the football club. I'm making every decision like I'm going to be here forever, knowing I could be gone tomorrow. That's in any job, I've used that line since I first went into football – whether that's clubs putting bids in for me as a manager or being 30 seconds from the sack at Bristol City on two occasions.
"This is the life of a 500-game manager, unfortunately. I think it's a brilliant club, and I get up with the same enthusiasm every day. Coming in, trying to make decisions.
"Of course I'm frustrated. Do you not think I wanted to come in and smash it from day one, and end up challenging the Old Firm? Of course I did.
"That was the dreamer in me, but the realist in me knows that there is a lot to do at this football club and that's what I'm fighting to do. I hope people appreciate that and I hope the naysayers inevitably turn positive when we do get it right.”
Johnston knows it’s survival of the fittest at Easter Road today but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t feel for the guy in the opposite dugout. Goodwin received the more barbed vote of confidence of all time in the wake of Aberdeen’s nightmare Scottish Cup exit to junior outfit Darvel.
But Johnson said: “I always have empathy for managers because everybody is facing their own challenges and hurdles. When managers talk to each other in private, of course, every club is different.
“Managers sometimes naturally get the finger pointed at them, as we all do, myself included, and some people can’t cope with that, they struggle with it. Jim is big enough and ugly enough to cope with anything that’s thrown at him.
“My focus is obviously solely on us and the game, for me that is just external noise to a game we see as really important for our season’s success.”
Johnson saw some positive signs last week despite Hearts hitting three past his side. There was nothing for the Dons to take from Darvel except a sense of shame.
Johnson said: “You’d expect a reaction. I played in those games and they are not easy.
“Darvel are much better than their league with the money they’re putting into the squad. You could see the goal, you pepper their goal and don’t finish, it happens, it’s football, that’s why we love it.
“It happens down in England all the time. I have been part of massive upsets.
“It’s a new game, anything in the past is gone and we have to focus on this one.”
Johnson reckons what’s happening at Pittodrie is ‘none of his business’. In fairness, he’s got plenty on his plate in Leith.
Martin Boyle and Rocky Bushiri out long term, Kyle Magennis also injured and Ryan Porteous offski. Nisbet remaining if a heck of a boost, even if the knock on effect will be less chances for the manager to bring in the two or three transfer targets he was nudging along in the final few days of the window.
Johnson admitted this season hasn’t panned out how he planned but that doesn’t mean he’s going to write it off just yet. He said: “It’s been a battle, hasn’t it? It’s not been plain sailing and it won’t be.
“It’s very rare you get a job like we left Sunderland in when we were two points off top going into the run in. There’s areas of the club and team that needs changing, needs adapting and we’re really trying to do that.
“It’s turned into a bit of a transitional season that nobody wanted but at the same time the plan is clear. We’ve got bags to play for, loads. Even in the starting eleven there is enough experience, international caps in there. We’ve been unfortunate. If you look at our injuries, I mean – come on.
“It’s top players in a budget like ours, to lose them for as long as we have is never easy. We’ve had all those hurdles but we’re still fighting, no one is giving in, the boys are working had every day.
“Whatever people say about the result and how much it hurst there were positive to our performance against Hearts and we have to take that into the Aberdeen game, which given the right bits of luck and quality we can win.”
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