Scottish Championship: Hibernian ease past Cowdenbeath at Easter Road

Hibernian maintained their promotion challenge in the Scottish Championship with a comfortable 5-0 victory over Cowdenbeath at Easter Road.

In what was largely a one-sided contest, the hosts netted twice inside the opening half-an-hour before adding three more goals during the closing 16 minutes.

Hibs required just nine minutes to open the scoring with Paul Hanlon firing home from close range following Scott Allan's corner.

And 15 minutes later they doubled their advantage through Jason Cummings who located the bottom left hand corner of the net after latching on to Scott Allan’s cross.

Cummings could have put the Edinburgh club out of sight by half-time but was twice denied by visiting keeper Robbie Thomson, while also firing wide from inside the box.

Struggling Cowdenbeath, who began the match with just one point out of the last 12, were limited to long range efforts which failed to trouble home keeper Mark Oxley.

Hibs continued to control matters after the break with Cummings and Hanlon missing decent opportunities.

Cowdenbeath were presented with a rare good opportunity to reduce the deficit on 64 when Kudus Oyenuga headed narrowly wide from a corner.

However, this only spurred on the hosts who grabbed a decisive third goal 10 minutes later from Scott Robertson who killed off the visitors when he met Dylan McGeouch’s pass to find the bottom right-hand corner of the net.

Six minutes from time Callum Booth made it 4-0 with a rising shot, after running on to Samuel Stanton’s lay off.

And Stanton was also the provider in the final minute, setting up Lewis Stevenson to add a fifth from 20 yards.

The win, which was their third over Cowdenbeath this season, keeps Hibs third in the table and leaves their out-played opponents just above the relegation zone.