Thornton Hibs boss Craig Gilbert hails his side's 'extraordinary' run

With Thornton leading 1-0 at Memorial Park thanks to Garry Thomson’s opener, Gould appeared to go down theatrically in the box to earn Thistle a spot kick which he stepped up to take but was denied brilliantly by the diving Sutherland, with Thornton then adding second half goals through Stuart Drummond (penalty), Ross Hain, Andy McCallion and Keir Allan.

Gilbert told the Fife Free Press: “Dalkeith had beaten us 6-0 in the first game of the season and Mikey scored a couple of goals and ran riot.

"He started on Saturday despite an ankle knock and he dived for the penalty.

“Calum guessed the right way and made a great save. He was roaring in Mikey’s face after the penalty save.

“And all the boys were surrounding Mikey saying: ‘You shouldn’t be cheating like that’.

"And he shouldn’t be because it’s against his old team. Why does he want to do that?”

Second-placed Hibs – who moved onto 62 points from 24 games by beating Thistle – face two key league matches as they host fourth-placed Edinburgh South this Wednesday, kick-off 7.15pm, before a trip to Armadale Thistle this Saturday, kick-off 2.30pm.

“We’re on a very good run, kind of extraordinary,” Gilbert said. “Managers and teams all want it to happen, but it doesn’t really happen does it?

"We’ve been pretty consistent, pretty good. We’ve got a really good squad this year and everybody’s happy.

"But the boys are not under any illusions that it’s all done and dusted.

“We’ve still got to win games because we’re not mathematically promoted yet.

"Fingers crossed it will happen this week if all goes well.

"We’ve got one eye on winning the league as well, as we play leaders Bo’ness Athletic at home on May 11.

"We also need them to slip up, which I don’t expect.

“They’ve been really good only losing two games all season, one of which was to us.

"But Bo’ness have just been buying players whenever they want. They’ve got really good backers behind them with money, something that we don’t have. We can’t compete with that.”