Hibernian hope to unleash Myziane Maolida and Emiliano Marcondes on Rangers

Nick Montgomery is excited about the prospect of unleashing new attackers Myziane Maolida and Emiliano Marcondes on Rangers as Hibernian prepare to resume their cinch Premiership campaign on Wednesday.

Both players have checked in at Easter Road on loan until the end of the season, with former Lyon and Nice forward Maolida, 24, joining from Hertha Berlin last week and 28-year-old former Nordsjaelland and Brentford striker Marcondes sealing his move from Bournemouth on Monday.

Manager Montgomery is enthused by the pedigree of the duo and believes they will enhance the Hibs attack for the second half of the season.

“We’ve had a lot of players out injured and we haven’t really had any competition in that front four so it’s been a lot of work-load on Jair Tavares, Elie Youan, Dylan Vente and Martin Boyle and what we’ve really lacked is any impact off the bench,” said the Hibees boss.

“To bring players in of the quality of Myziane and Emiliano in January speaks volumes for what we are trying to do.

“We’ve got four boys away on international duty so it’s a good time to get some reinforcements in and I’m really excited for the two new players to integrate and start getting game time.”

Montgomery feels Maolida and Marcondes – who have been playing for the Hertha and Bournemouth second strings respectively – are ready to be pitched straight into the squad for the visit of Rangers.

“We’re hopeful Myziane’s paperwork is completed in time and Emiliano will be available,” he said. “They’ve both been playing games before they came.

“Myziane scored a huge goal for his national team against Ghana in November and he’s been playing B teams – and the same with Marcondes, he’s been playing under-23s games.

“They’re both fit and raring to go but they’re coming into a new environment and we train at a high intensity so it may take them a couple of weeks to get fully up to speed but they’ve both played at the highest level and they understand where they are.

“Ideally they’ll both be in the squad and it’s a good opportunity to start the second half of the season at home against Rangers.”

Hibernian, who are currently missing eight players in total due to injury and international duty, announced on Tuesday the loan departures of fringe men Riley Harbottle to Colchester, Max Boruc to Arbroath, Allan Delferriere to Czech side MFK Vyskov, while Emmanuel Johnson left by mutual consent.

Montgomery still hopes to replenish his squad with further additions, including a centre-back.

“We were closing to getting a defender in the last few weeks, it was virtually done, then circumstances changed,” he said.

“We are pretty light at centre-back, especially with Rocky away. It just leaves us with Paul Hanlon and Will Fish so if there’s an opportunity to bring someone in and they’re the right player, we’ll look to do it.”