Grant McCann still believes despite body blow for Hull City

The Tigers lost 1-0 in a crucial bottom-of-the-table clash against Charlton Athletic which had been delayed 98 days because of the coronavirus.

The win moved Lee Bowyer's Addicks above Hull, Middlesbrough and Huddersfield Town and out of the relegation zone, with the Tigers taking their place.

But although he did nothing to hide his disappointment at the result, McCann is confident things will improve as his side scrapes off the rust.

“If I didn't have any hope I wouldn't be sat here,” he said. “We know the players will get better the more they train, the more they play.

“Of course we're disappointed, we're never happy when we lose a game but we've got to take the positives out of the game. We've got eight big games left and it's going to be really tight down there. There are going to be a lot more twists and turns.

“I know we're going to get better and sharper as the games come. We need to start that next week.

“Today was disappointing for everybody but we have to make sure we analyse this game properly and go on to Birmingham (a week today).”

The only goal came from a corner, headed in by Jason Pearce after 18 minutes.

“In an attacking sense, no (Hull weren't good enough) but I thought generally we were in control,” said McCann. “We had probably three times the penalty areas Charlton had and when you have that you've got to score. We didn't seem to get on the end of any cross or any ball that dropped in the box.

“The story of the game is they scored off a set play and we had one similar and didn't score, that's what's frustrating.

“In every goal there's always two or three mistakes. The first one is we let (Tomer) Hemed get across us at the front post, the second one is could George (Long) punch it further but I'll need to watch it back. The third one is we lose a man who taps in at the back post.

“Nine times out of ten on every goal you concede there's three people could do better and that was probably the case today.”

Opposite number Bowyer disagreed that Hull were the better team.

“I think it was well deserved,” he said of his side's win. “From the first whistle we were at it, we looked sharp.

“To get the goal early on was nice. I thought that on another day we could have scored a couple of goals if the quality was better in the final third.”

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