| Fair enough in the end - match thoughts 19:19 - Nov 18 with 1609 views | LankHenners |
The sun shone on the city of culture as Town took on the Tigers. The winding path which leads from just off the station to the KCOM stadium provides ample time for wondering and predicting pre-match, and reflection after it. How would Mick set up today? Keeping the same as against Preston was the easiest choice, although a sterner and more balanced midfield may have been more useful here.
As it turned out we were unchanged, whilst Hull made 4 changes, McGregor in goal, Aina, Dawson, Hector and Tomori in front of him, Larsson and Stewart the two holding midfielders, with Dicko up front ahead of Groskicki, Henriksen and Bowen. After a well observed 'Last Post' and minute's silence, we were under way.
Town started brightly, the referee happy to award free kicks when Garner hit the deck and our high tempo and pressing forced an early corner when McGregor pushed away our tenacious forward's header. Played short, then hit to the edge of the box, knocked in, bounced around, fell to Knudsen who turned an awkward shot against a defender and McGoldrick was left with plenty of time and space to strike across the Scot in goal for 1-0. It was a promising start and we pounced on a moment of dodgy defending (an important theme this afternoon).
The game quickly drifted into a fairly standard, dull Championship affair: Hull had plenty of the ball but we forced them back into their own half whilst the ref found a taste for blowing on his whistle. Garner attempted an audacious lob after a sloppy Hull pass but it was comfortably wide, whilst Bowen fired a powerful shot at goal which was at a good height for Bart to catch. Hull had tried to pass it around us with little success so resorted to trying to send Bowen, Dicko and Grosicki on their bikes, the latter caught offside when quicker reactions/better timing would have seen him one-on-one.
As the game pressed on Hull began to grow in confidence. Realising that we'd eased off and we struggling to come up with anything when we did have the ball, full backs Aina and Tomori pushed forward to almost become wingers, leaving Dawson and Hector as a back 2 with Stewart prowling in front of them. It was to be a successful tactic from Slutsky: good possession on their right led to Aina firing a ball to Dicko who sold Connolly too easily with a deft flick which Grosicki found to hit a deflected low ball across the six yard box to Bowen to hit into the roof of the net despite Bart's best efforts to keep it out.
Whilst it hadn't necessarily been coming, Hull had become braver and more confident on the ball, and the little interchanges and flicks paid off.
They were nearly in again when a weak Skuse back-header saw Webster nudge Henriksen to the floor as he looked to break into the box. The training-ground-routine free kick was wasted and the half petered out to what was a fairly fair scoreline at the interval. A slightly surreal penalty shoot out at half time where small children took it in turns to roll the ball into the corner past a man in a big panda suit was ended when Hull's answer to Rob Chandler suggested the two other Tiger mascots get in goal as well. Eventually enough were saved to crown a winner whilst announcer and crowd alike roasted the mascots on their performance before the two unchanged teams jogged out for the 2nd half.
Town started brightly again in a half which began with several free kicks awarded by and increasing whistle-happy ref: Celina hitting an easy shot through to McGregor. The city 'keeper had the ball at his feet a couple of minutes later and took a fairly standard kick up towards his forward line. Easy enough to deal with, you'd have thought. Unfortunately, Chambers got his bearings all wrong, only managing to head the ball upwards to then get outmuscled in the air, whilst no-one else anticipated the danger so Dicko had a clean run on goal and he calmly placed the ball past Bart into the net for 2-1.
Poor defending again. Chambers made the error but neither Webster or Spence tucked in when Chambers failed to clear the ball at the first attempt. We struggled in the air all day which I though was odd considering our comparative height advantage in our defensive half. Out balls to Spence weren't as successful as they should have been, whilst there were too many misjudged flights which led to making clumsy fouls our conceding unnecessary throw-ins.
We had half a chance to level almost straight away, Garner and Waghorn managing to feed the ball to McGoldrick whose shot was blocked out to Celina who took the (correct) decision to chest the ball rather than head it with little power from a bad angle, but could only find a Hull defender when he brought the ball down. A good counter attack saw Groskicki played into the box with space but the Polish winger scuffed his shot horribly short of the near post.
The half continued with Hull stepping up their streetwise game: shielding the ball and waiting for a frustrated Town player to push them to the floor. The ref was happy to oblige. Garner became public enemy number 1 with a bad foul followed by a needless reaction which led to 'off, off, off!' chants from the home fans who only made a noise after they went ahead.
The game wore on with neither team creating much - Dicko shot wide for Hull whilst Connolly spanked an ambitious 30-yard half volley well past the post. Australian international Jackson Irvine replaced Grosicki who had shown flashes of good attacking play but Irvine was clearly the more rounded player as he picked up a left sided role. We needed a substitution but Mick held on.
The game was looking to drift further until Waghorn found space to drive at the box. A little stepover and a shimmy fooled a couple of Hull defenders and Stewart, who had been a very calming presence in the centre of midfield, reached out a leg and took Martyn out. Pretty soft but there were few complaints - contact was clearly made and it would be something for some of Hull's players to start complaining about going down easily.
McGoldrick waited whilst the referee Coote made sure all the players were outside of the box. As he stepped up his body language gave away his intention: he was going for the bottom left. McGregor read this too as the shot, which was barely near the corner anyway, was palmed up in the air and headed behind. The bearded McGoldrick pulled his hands down his face with his mouth open. He knew he messed up.
We made a double switch the Ward replacing Waghorn and Bru Connolly, the former change booed. Waghorn was looking the more spritely, especially once he was eventually put out onto the right hand side, and McGoldrick had little influence since his early goal. Meyler replaced Larsson to add a bit more steel for Hull as they looked to hold this one out.
A couple of half-chances at either end came to nothing and Sears came on for McGoldrick. He gave Hull something different to worry about and they dropped a touch deeper to prevent us from playing him in behind. Garner began to find more space as well with Dawson and Hector dropping off him. The wily ex-Rangers man won a free kick and from there we managed to scrappily craft something.
Celina had two bites and delivering a ball into the box and on the 2nd occasion Webster rose highest to flick the ball on. Spence grappled with his man and both of them lunged for the ball. From where I was it was hard to tell who actually connected but Spence wheeled away after the ball trickled off the post over the line and the Town fans found their voice again. Lots of hugging and punching the air on and off the pitch gave a sense that we weren't quite done.
Hull came closest to scoring a third when sub Diomande somehow headed the ball well wide of the post with a diving effort, but despite getting the ball wide outside the Tigers' box more than once we were unable to create anything more in the 5 additional minutes and we had our first draw of the season.
Overall it was you standard Championship game - one team had more possession, the other more direct, but neither 'keeper having to make any strenuous saves. It was always likely that below-par defending was going to be the highest likelihood of giving us goals and that can be said for all 4 goals - our first and Hull's 2nd in particular.
Bart had little to do bar make the odd catch. His distribution wasn't the best but the 'kick it out wide for someone to flick on' tactic was breaking down at the receiving end in any case. The defence wavered between solid enough and making a silly mistake. Knudsen again the pick of the bunch - a good outlet going forwards and Hull gradually began to see Spence as a better target. Our point-rescuer had a mixed game: struggled to win much in the air and could have done something about both goals but again was left exposed by having very-obviously-not-a-right-midfielder McGoldrick in front of him.
Chambers made a bad error for the 2nd goal but generally coped well, whilst Webster had a few misjudgments but was similarly generally solid.
Skuse was pick of the bunch in the first half - tireless closing down and kept us calm on the ball when we had it. Faded in the 2nd but continued to make several tackles and interceptions, including one stormer from behind which an inexperienced player would have got hideously wrong. Connolly didn't really stand out, which I take as a good thing, made good simple passes and was there to intercept but was spun too easily for the equaliser.
Celina was largely anonymous and looked like someone you would bring on as a sub to see if he would do something different rather than a starter. Is looking more sensible though - recognised Knudsen's runs and combined well with him. However he needs to be more anticipating of where the ball's going to be so he can get on it and drive at the defence more. Clearly has talent, though.
Not the best day for McGoldrick bar the goal - far too slow to be stuck out on the wing and often took too long on the ball when he did have it. Some nice touches and combinations when he drifted into the centre but today was a reminder that this approach of sticking all the forwards on at once is not sustainable. Waghorn was fairly quiet and was restricted to lots of closing down and tireless runs. Good quality and experience to win the penalty, whilst his set pieces were better than the have been in recent weeks.
Garner battled hard once again and when he did get the better of his opponents he kept us on the ball and looking like we might do something. I think we'd see the best out of him in a partnership up front, but a very good team-player performance from him today.
Difficult to pick and outright MOTM: Waghorn is the safe choice as he worked so hard off the ball and showed his quality when he did have it. Knudsen and Skuse both had very solid games whilst we'd have struggled without Garner today for sure.
Overall then an even game with two teams playing below their best gifting each other goals with sloppy defending. This system isn't a great one in my eyes, although it has the potential to see us through (especially against weaker teams where the forwards can flourish) if Mick stops putting McGoldrick out wide and we have a better box-to-box midfielder in there ahead of the nothing-less-than-6/10-every-week Connolly. Hopefully Huws is back before too long, and Adeyemi too, as either one of those will give us a boost.
Positives: good fight to get back the goal late on, defence generally looking more solid as a unit, continued improvement of Knudsen, again shown we can take advantage of small moments of quality we do produce.
Negatives: weren't good enough - dropped tempo and energy levels too much, allowed Hull a path to grow into the game, late substitutions - hard for them to have much of an impact when we needed something earlier in the 2nd half to give Hull something else to worry about, still making sloppy individual errors.
We weren't great, neither were they, typical Championship encounter lacking in real quality. The knowledge we can play better is good to have, although Mick is still left with a conundrum on how best to set us out. Rotation may well be necessary in the coming weeks with a packed schedule, and to be honest I welcome it. |  |
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| Fair enough in the end - match thoughts on 19:31 - Nov 18 with 1563 views | Steve_M |
Really good report.
Nice to read one from someone who was actually there.  |  |
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| Fair enough in the end - match thoughts on 19:36 - Nov 18 with 1548 views | jeera |
| Fair enough in the end - match thoughts on 19:31 - Nov 18 by Steve_M |
Really good report.
Nice to read one from someone who was actually there. |
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| Fair enough in the end - match thoughts on 20:21 - Nov 18 with 1441 views | cbower |
Very good report and pretty much as I saw it. The game was there to be won in the first 20 mins but we did not press home our advantage. Ref was whistle happy giving so many free kicks for nothing challenges all game. The shoe horning is a flaw and I hope this goes when he has a full midfield to choose from. Thought Connolly looked competent. Slightly disagree about Webster. He looks off the pace to me and got caught out several times with poor decision making. Since he has come back, I have yet to see him show the calm ability on the ball and distribution he was showing last year. I think Knudsen is playing really well. Improve his delivery and he will look quite a player. Waghorn or even Jonas on pens for me. Mind you, we so rarely get one, perhaps they are not quite sure themselves! |  |
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| Fair enough in the end - match thoughts on 22:13 - Nov 18 with 1339 views | LankHenners |
| Fair enough in the end - match thoughts on 20:21 - Nov 18 by cbower |
Very good report and pretty much as I saw it. The game was there to be won in the first 20 mins but we did not press home our advantage. Ref was whistle happy giving so many free kicks for nothing challenges all game. The shoe horning is a flaw and I hope this goes when he has a full midfield to choose from. Thought Connolly looked competent. Slightly disagree about Webster. He looks off the pace to me and got caught out several times with poor decision making. Since he has come back, I have yet to see him show the calm ability on the ball and distribution he was showing last year. I think Knudsen is playing really well. Improve his delivery and he will look quite a player. Waghorn or even Jonas on pens for me. Mind you, we so rarely get one, perhaps they are not quite sure themselves! |
I actually (semi-jokingly) thought about letting Knudsen have a go on penalties! He'd smack them so hard even if they weren't right in the corners most 'keepers wouldn't react in time.
I see what you mean about Webster, I guess I meant that as a whole the defence didn't look so ragged and generally looked more solid. Definitely a couple of times he moved forwards to meet the ball then realised too late that he's moved too far and it bounced over him, and yeah, we're yet to really see the 'ball playing centre back' he was billed as and showed us in patches last season. | |
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