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Richard Sutcliffe: Fortune could favour Hull if they choose to be brave
DESCRIBING a run of three home games in seven February days as "the biggest in the history of Hull City", as Phil Brown did earlier this week, smacked of the Tigers manager being swept away by the hyperbole that often accompanies life in the Premier League.
The mouth-watering prospect of taking on relegation rivals Tottenham Hotspur and Blackburn Rovers either side of an FA Cup fifth-round replay against Sheffield United in such a short space of time admittedly always had the potential of influencing how the rest of the season would pan out.
But to claim the six points on offer and the chance of a first
FA Cup quarter-final appearance in 38 years amounted to the most crucial week in the club's 105-year history was, it has to be said, rather over-egging the situation.
Brown's comments in his programme notes for Monday night's game against Spurs did, however, show just how fraught Hull's top-flight debut has become.
The euphoria of the opening nine games when newly-promoted Hull swept almost all before them to go joint top of the Premier League on points with Liverpool and Chelsea has long since given way to an uneasy sense that the campaign could yet end horribly.
The money on offer in the world's richest league meant the stakes were always going to be high this term, but last month's 5m signing of Jimmy Bullard – and, in particular, the handing of a hugely lucrative four-and-a-half year contract to the now injured midfielder – raised them to almost stratospheric levels.
Remaining among the elite is now paramount, as a quick glance around the Football League – and Yorkshire in particular – vividly illustrates with a host of clubs still paying the price for over-stretching themselves, something that may have played a part in Brown's statement about the vital importance of this week.
Bearing in mind the significance attached to this week's three home games, back-to-back league reverses would undoubtedly lead to the alarm bells ringing loudly around the East Riding.
This is a point not lost on the players with Andy Dawson, who made his 400th senior appearance in the 2-1 reverse against the Londoners, insisting: "We know every defeat is dragging us further in, but one win would change everything.
"The lads were obviously devastated to lose because we definitely did enough to get something out of the game. It was a chance to put daylight between ourselves and the rest.
"We have lost a few games late on (recently) and it can get you down but the good thing for us is we have a good set of lads in the changing room.
"If we can get a win (against Sheffield United) then it would send us into Sunday with confidence. And then if we could beat Blackburn it would be massive (in terms of the season)."
Dawson's final point is a pertinent one with Hull, even allowing for the horrendous run of form that has yielded just nine points from a possible 51, still being in an enviable position.
They sit six points clear of the relegation zone with 12 games to play.
A win on Sunday and the gap between Brown's men and Blackburn, who occupy the third and final relegation place this morning, would be nine points. And even though the Lancastrians boast a game in hand on the rest of the bottom half, it would still take an almighty surge of form for Sam Allardyce's men to make up the ground on Hull.
In that respect, Sunday's game is by far the most important since promotion was won at Wembley last May with even a draw being sufficient to keep a major rival at arm's length.
How Brown approaches the game remains to be seen but it is to be hoped that the lure of putting a three-victory cushion between himself and his managerial mentor will be enough to persuade the Tigers chief to take some of the shackles off his side.
The one criticism that could be levelled at Hull on Monday night was the safety-first attitude that saw Daniel Cousin, Hull's only recognised striker on the field at the time, being replaced by Bernard Mendy midway through the second half. The inference was clear as Brown looked to hold on to what he had got, namely a point, by playing just Richard Garcia up front on his own.
Against an expensively assembled but clearly disjointed Spurs side, it was tempting to wonder whether a better approach would have been to bring on the attacking potency of Mendy in tandem with that of Geovanni in an attempt to claim a win that Harry Redknapp later admitted would "have more or less made Hull safe".
It is not the first time, either, that Hull have fallen foul of buckling in the face of late pressure at home with West Brom, Arsenal, Aston Villa and now Spurs having denied Brown's men vital points in each of the club's last four league outings at the KC.
Trying to prove that the results would have been any different had the Tigers been more attack-minded is a futile exercise.
But it is to be hoped that if the result is in the balance this Sunday in the closing stages that Hull stay true to the attacking intent that characterised the opening months of their first-ever season in the top flight.
In football, as in life, fortune does often favour the brave and if this proves to be the case against Blackburn then one February week might, while not quite living up to Brown's dramatic build-up in his programme notes last Monday, yet prove to be season-defining for all the right reasons.
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Saturday 26 May 2012
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