Ian Gordon directly addresses scathing Bill Foley jibe as 'Hibs first' reminder sent to billionaire's Black Knights

Foley had claimed the Easter Road hierarchy had knocked back his advice Get the latest news from Record Sport with our daily newsletter We have more newsletters Get the latest news from Record Sport with our daily newsletter We have more newsletters Executive director Ian Gordon has played down of a split in the Hibs boardroom after Bill Foley's swipe at the hierarchy earlier this summer. Foley accused those at the top level of the club of ignoring his input following his £6million investment in the Scottish Premiership club - as he claimed that they WOULD start following his masterplan off the back of a humbling League Cup defeat to Kelty Hearts. Foley bought a 25 per cent stake in the club earlier this year to add the capital side to his multi-club Black Knight consortium which also includes the Premier League Bournemouth, A-League Auckland and French side Lorient who were relegated from Ligue 1 last season - with the group taking two seats on the board.

The comments followed a busy summer of key decisions with the football structure at Easter Road in Leith with former SFA Performance Director Malky Mackay arriving as sporting director in June before David Gray was appointed head coach. And following a winless start to the league campaign, executive director Gordon has moved to cool talk of divisions within the club between Foley’s group and the club’s American owners - with the Gordon family owning just over 60 per cent of Hibs. Speaking to Sky Sports News, Gordon said: "I think it's been well reported that throughout the appointing of our sporting director and manager Black Knight was very involved in that process, but when it came down to it the family and the board felt it was the best choice to make the appointments that we did.



" Pressed on if the decisions show the club have autonomy from Foley's group, he went on: "Yes. I think that does show that it's always Hibs first." He was then quizzed if he had to "mend bridges" with Foley and those within the consortium, adding: "There have been discussions since then and the relationship is in a good place.

We are in constant communication with the guys at Bournemouth, with Ryan Caswell as well and now Tim (Bezbatchenko, new president of Black Knight Group). Tim is going to be coming up and there is going to be certain people from Bournemouth's team coming up to work with our guys." Hibs also failed to snap up any players from within the group last summer - raising some eyebrows over a split behind the scenes.

Gordon explained: "We looked at the network, and there was players lined up from the network, but injuries happened and these sort of things come up. It was sort of out of our power a bit. We would love to bring in players from the network but it just didn't work out that way.

".