Town boss Kieran McKenna admitted the Blues’ 2-0 victory over Hull City at the MKM Stadium wasn’t perfect but his team showed the qualities required to win a tough midweek away games on a difficult surface.
Second-half goals from Marcelino Nunez and Chuba Akpom, his first for the club, within four minutes of one another saw Town to their third away win on the bounce.
There had been little in it for much of the game but the Blues found a way to get on top and then secure a victory which takes them up to fourth, three points off the top two with a game in hand on all those above them.
"I thought we showed the qualities that you need on some nights like this,” McKenna said. "Games in the Championship, midweek on a difficult pitch, a difficult surface, both teams really struggled to get to grips with it in the first half.
"And showed some good learning as a group there because, and we’ve spoken about it plenty now, but on those times when it’s not perfect, like the first half when we couldn’t really get the control that we wanted, you have to stay intense, you have to stay together, your defensive organisation has to be really good, and I thought it was.
"I thought we pressed really well all night, made it really hard for Hull to build as well, and they’ve been a really good attacking force. We really stopped them playing through the pitch at all.
"The only giveaways we gave were a couple of poor moments on the ball, but in terms of our defensive organisation, it was excellent. Mentality at half-time was good, we knew that we could push on in the game.
"We improved in the second half, found a rhythm on the ball a bit better, adjusted to the conditions better and then you saw when we got the first goal a big, big difference, confidence grows in the team and the opponent gives you a little bit more space and stops defending quite as hard.
"And from that moment on, we looked like we could score any number of goals and we still kept the defensive resilience.
"We knew it wasn’t perfect tonight but one of the biggest learnings for me, for the group, for the club, over this last month or two as a group, has to be that it isn’t going to be perfect.
"It wasn’t like that when we got 97 points [in the 2023/24 promotion season] and we had a team that had played together for to years, so it’s how we are in the tough moments, how we are when it’s not perfect. That in the end will be decisive.
"I think to come out with a win tonight and a clean sheet in that sort of setting is a positive.”
Once again the Blues’ subs played their part with Philogene, a former Hull player, sending in the cross for Nunez’s header and Akpom, who had a loan spell with the Tigers early in his career, netting the second.
"I’ve said it enough times, you can probably dig up some old quotes,” McKenna smiled. "It’s one of the most important things in a league which has 46 games.
"It’s why we want to have a strong squad. What I will say again is that the starters have to tee-up the game well for the subs and, as much as we weren’t perfect in the first half, George Hirst and Marcelino pressing against two centre-halves, against the goalkeeper was top, took Hull’s confidence away on the ball.
"Kasey [McAteer] an outstanding job against [Ryan] Giles at left-back, who I think has been the top assist-maker in the league, an outstanding job defensively to really completely limit any threat they had done that side. Jack Clarke, good job defensively, winning second balls, duels.
"Those things tee the game up. If you don’t do those things well, then you’re bringing on good subs maybe at 1-0 down and then it’s a completely different challenge.
"If can’t be perfect, if we can’t give the subs a lead, then be tough, work hard, make the other team tired, let them know that they’re in a battle and then the boys coming on with 25, 30 minutes to go have got a great chance to push on against a tired opponent, and they certainly did that.
"They all had a good impact from Jack [Taylor] at half-time to the next three [Akpom, Jaden Philogene and Sindre Walle Egeli], to Ben [Johnson] seeing the game out. They all had a good impact and they all capitalised on the hard work early in the game and the spaces that were open and looked a big threat.”
McKenna was delighted to see Akpom get off the mark for the Blues, coincidentally at the ground where he scored his first senior goal for the Tigers against Huddersfield in August 2015.
"Any forward, of course, you want to get the first goal,” the Blues boss continued. "For me, with forward players, it’s never just about that by any means, it’s about what you give the team on the ball, off the ball, in the dressing room, all of those things.
"And if you do all those things, then you’ll have an important role to play but for a forward they just also want to get that first goal, and that’s understandable. It doesn’t really matter how it goes in, he certainly could have had a few already, but he’ll feel better for that one going over the line and, like the rest of the boys, keep pushing on.”
Town recorded back-to-back clean sheets for the first time since March 2024, which McKenna says is something which has been worked on.
"That’s important,” he said. "There’s no doubt about it, we’ve hammered down on those messages over the last few weeks because in the early parts of the season we really weren’t conceding many chances but moments were costing us and we were conceding more goals than we should have been for the general level of our defending as a team and the quality I believe we have in our defenders.
"We’ve pushed down on that in the last few weeks and all those messages about the importance of clean sheets about not giving away things, about if the game isn’t going for us with an early goal, then if we can keep a clean sheet, if we can defend well, then we’ve got a great chance to go and win games later on if we can’t win them early. And the group’s getting a good feel for that.
"We’ve got to keep it going, have still got loads to improve on. Again, we made a couple of mistakes in there tonight that could have cost us, but I think that mindset of defensive organisation as our base and giving ourselves 95 minutes to win a game, that’s important.
"That’s why, after Saturday, as much as it’s frustrating to draw 0-0, and it’s a game that we should have won, I still said to the group that if we give ourselves 95 minutes to win a game and we have that much territory and that many shots, although we could do better on the day, more often than not, we’ll go and win the game.
"It’s an important base to build on and we’re trying to hammer down on that at the moment.”
Town are now unbeaten in six, have won three away in a row and are up to fourth, but McKenna insists that doesn’t matter to him at all.
"Zero for me, to be honest,” the Northern Irishman said. "It’s not the top six or seventh or fifth, where the cut line is isn’t for 30-plus games.
"Of course, we’d rather be top of the league and have won all of our games, but fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth, it doesn’t make a difference to me, I don’t think to the group for now.
"Of course, supporters look at that cut-off line on their phone or when it comes up on TV and they probably feel better on that side of it.
"For me, I look for the progress elsewhere. I think we’ve been progressing since the first international break and transfer window closed and the group came together.
"Not always linear, a long way from perfect, lots to do, all the same things apply tonight after we win as on Saturday when we didn’t manage to get the win over the line.
"But we have to stay stable, we have to stay together, have to stay clear-headed and keep looking to improve in every area and I think definitely, if you’ve talking about the run that we’re on now, I think from a mental point of view, we’ve made some good strides about what the Championship is, what it takes to be successful and that’s going to be really, really important for what we’ve got coming up.”