Great expectations should not be dashed by early setbacks – Windass

THE season tickets have been sold, as have the replica shirts and optimism abounds at clubs up and down the land.

Yes, it is that time of year when all teams are equal and anything seems possible ahead of the big kick-off.

The World Cup may have been the dullest for some time but all that will be forgotten as a date that has been written in every fan's diary since the new fixtures were published finally arrives.

Regardless of whether it be fans of promoted Leeds United or those whose loyalties lay with either Hull City or Sheffield Wednesday, a sense of anticipation is apparent.

Can this really be our year? Will the new signings be any good? And is the manager really the man to deliver success?

All those questions and more can, of course, only be answered by what happens during the coming weeks and months.

That, though, will not stop many supporters from making a snap judgement come 5pm tomorrow – or 7.30pm in the case of Leeds followers – as to how their team is going to fare this season.

It is, perhaps, inevitable considering the hype that surrounds the start of a new season that a team can be written off or all-but-promoted on the basis of just 90 minutes.

One man, however, who knows that too much should not necessarily be read into the opening result is Dean Windass, the 41-year-old who carved

his name into Hull sporting folklore a little over two years ago with the goal that earned City a place in the Premier League.

It was the culmination of a never-to-be forgotten few months for the Tigers, though what is often overlooked is how Phil Brown's side started that campaign with a 3-2 defeat at home to Plymouth Argyle.

Windass recalls: "We had only just avoided relegation the previous season so, when we lost on the opening day, there were a few moans.

"There had been a bit of expectation because the club had spent some money in the summer, though Jay-Jay (Okocha) and Caleb Folan were still to join us at that stage.

"So, losing the opening game came as a big disappointment to the fans and the players. In a funny way, though, it did us a favour as losing brought us down to earth.

"What it also showed is that too much should not be read into the first game. It is how you finish that matters, as we proved at Hull.

"We didn't really get going until the second half of the season, and even then we had a few stumbles.

"There was one defeat when we were eighth or ninth in the table, after which Phil (Brown) called a meeting and told us to forget all about the play-offs because we weren't good enough.

"It was a real telling-off but, from that day on, we went on a great run by focusing on one game at a time rather than where we would finish.

"The key to having a successful season is getting yourself in a position where you can kick on with 10-15 games to go.

"That is why too much should not be read into how a first game ends. No team has been relegated after the first game and no team has won promotion.

"A lot of the time, it can take players five games to get into their stride and be fully match fit."

Windass's theory that an opening day defeat need not necessarily be a major cause for concern is supported by Yorkshire football's longest unbeaten opening day record.

It is 21 years ago since Leeds last lost a first game of the season, four goals from Micky Quinn helping Newcastle United overturn a 2-1 half-time deficit to beat Howard Wilkinson's side 5-2 at a raucous St James' Park.

With United having invested heavily that summer to bring in the likes of Vinnie Jones and John Hendrie, such a thumping immediately had the more pessimistic among the Elland Road support forecasting the club's stay in the Second Division would be extended by at least another year.

Nine months later, however, United were Second Division champions and heading for the top flight.

It was a similar story for West Yorkshire rivals Bradford City, who lost at home to Stockport County on the opening day of the 1998-99 campaign only to go on and clinch promotion to the Premier League the following May.

Windass signed for the Bantams during that successful run-in, but believes how City fared on their return to the second tier two years later

could act as a useful lesson to Hull City ahead of the coming season.

As the Tigers prepare to host Swansea City tomorrow, he

said: "The problem Hull will have this season is similar to what we had at Bradford after being relegated from the Premier League.

"Basically, everyone wants to win at the home of a club who were in the Premier League the previous season.

"Clubs really raised their game at Bradford during that season after we had gone down (2001-02), which meant we never really got going apart from in the first few games.

"The encouraging bit for Hull is they have kept a lot of their players and I think could make the play-offs. Every manager will be thinking, 'Our goal this year is to get in the play-offs'.

"The good thing is Hull start at home, though whatever the result at the KC Stadium on Saturday, I hope the fans do not get too carried away by the result."

Opening day blues...

When Yorkshire clubs last lost their first game of the season:

Hull City 2009-10

Comp Defeat Final pos

Prem 2-1 v Chelsea (a) 19th

Bradford City 2009-10

L2 5-0 v Notts Co (a) 14th

Barnsley 2008-09

Ch 2-1 v QPR (a) 20th

Sheffield Utd 2008-09

Ch 1-0 v Birmingham (a) 3rd

Middlesbrough 2007-08

Prem 2-1 v Blackburn (H) 13th

Sheffield WedS 2007-08

Ch 4-1 v Ipswich (a) 16th

Doncaster 2006-07

L1 1-0 v Carlisle (a) 11th

Huddersfield 2006-07

L1 2-1 v Gillingham (a) 15th

Rotherham Utd 2006-07

L1 1-0 v Brighton (H) 23rd

Leeds United 1989-90

D2 5-2 Newcastle (a) 1st