Hull City 2 Bristol City 3: Slowness to rethink stops Tigers squirreling away more points on nuts afternoon
As well as being the most entertainment some in the ground had all afternoon, two pitch invasions by a persistent squirrel highlighted the mental fog around Hull City.
When it finally cleared, the opportunity to extend their unbeaten Championship run to six games had gone with it. They were able to pull Bristol City's lead back to 3-2, but no more than that.
Frustrating it was to see the game held up twice for a couple of minutes each just because of the grey gatecrasher, the breaks in play gave the Tigers a chance to rethink a plan that was not working.
Modern coaches love telling their goalkeeper to fake injury to force a "time-out" but instead of gathering around the technical area for a pep talk from Serge Jakirovic, Hull's players just stood around before carrying on in the same vein that had seen them go 3-1 down to a Bristol City side who put four past them at Ashton Gate.
In the end, the squirrel found the Robins' net as often as the Tigers, running into it twice – and once into Ivor Pandur's net for good measure – belatedly chased by a member of the ground staff brandishing a coat as he was given the runaround.
"Sign him up, sign up!" sang the home fans.
"You're getting mauled by a squirrel," they crowed.
Around 10 minutes after the first incursion, Jakirovic's second double substitution of the game finally abandoned a 3-4-2-1 shape that had just not worked, and would ultimately cost them any points.
It was a surprise when he named a team which matched Bristol City's shape as Paddy McNair made his debut as a third centre-back.
It did not help that John Lundstram came back into the side too. The former Sheffield United midfielder is a quality passer, but his tendency to drop between the central defenders was a problem when there are three of them, leaving a hollow midfield which made it hard for the team to keep the ball.
The Robins, far more used to playing in that shape, dominated the first quarter of the game, but surprisingly fell behind.
Emil Riis ought to have scored in the eighth minute after using his body cleverly to win the ball off John Egan without fouling him or touching it. It sent him through one-on-one, but his shot was tame and at Pandur.
Tomi Horavt missed the target completely with another good chance a few minutes later after Rob Atkinson showed more hunger than Joe Gelhardt to win the ball.
But it the 23rd minute Regan Slater played a great ball to Lewie Coyle, who hit his shot into the shins of Neto Borges.
A minute later, they were in front, Egan fizzing the ball through the vacant midfield into the feet of McBurnie, who played a one-two with Regan Slater, the central midfielder in front of him. McBurnie shifted the ball out of his feet and shot through the legs of Radek Vitek.
But this goal did not change the game.
A few minutes later former Tigers loanee Scott Twine picked up the ball in far too much space but hit shot from distance did not dip enough,
Hull only had themselves to blame for the 33rd-minute equaliser, Horvath's deep free-kick bouncing off a defender for a corner. Horvath put that in too and as a grappling Coyle and Atkinson dived to get a head on it, the away player appeared to get the final touch.
Horvat got the ball near the penalty spot again in far too much space but when Pandur saved, his team-mates failed to get the ball away and when it came back to Ross McCrorie, he lashed his side into a deserved lead.
Half-time gave the opportunity for a rethink but despite two changes, Plan A remained firmly in place. Liam Millar simply replaced Ryan Giles at left wing-back and Lewis Koumas led the line, McBurnie dropping into the pocket Kyle Jospeh had been in.
So unsurprisingly, the tide did not turn.
The visitors broke and found Twine in the inside-left channel. He threaded a pass which beautifully dissected the Hull defence and Riis did the rest to make it 3-1 after 50 minutes.
The squirrel disrupted the flow of the match for a good 10 minutes before Jakirovic finally switched to a back four.
Koumas put a header wide and Radek Vitek saved a thumping Gelhardt shot, but there could hardly be said to have been a sea-change. Straight on the back of that second attempt a fresh Sinclair Armstrong destroyed a flagging McNair for pace and Charlie Hughes seemed to hold off far too long before engaging in a successful penalty-area tackle.
Twine shot straight at Pandur.
It was only when Hull went down to one centre-back – Coyle moving across when debutant Toby Collyer came on for McNair – that the Tigers raised hopes on the home terraces.
Vitek fumbled a Koumas cross and Gelhardt tapped it across for substitute Kieran Dowell to volley in for 3-2.
With 12 minutes – plus time added on for squirrels – the home fans found their voice, encourage "Sergej's barmy army" onto them.
But for all their huffing and puffing, the Tigers did not do anywhere near enough in what turned out to be the last 22 minutes. Armstrong's shot at the goalkeeper from a tight angle after ragdolling Matty Jacob was the closest we came to a goal.
But for Hull to have taken anything after such a wrong-headed first hour would have been completely nuts.
Hull City: Pandur; McNair (Collyer 76), Egan (Jacob 65), Hughes; Coyle, Slater, Lundstram (Dowell 65), Giles (Millar HT); Gelhardt, Joseph (Koumas HT); McBurnie.
Unused substitutes: Phillips, Hadziahmetovic, Famewo, McCarthy.
Bristol City: Vítek; Tanner (Eile 90+7), Dickie, Atkinson; McCrorie (Sykes 70), Morsy (Williams 79), Randell, Neto Borges; Horvat (Burgzorg 79), Twine; Riis (Armstrong 70).
Unused substitutes: Pring, Lumley, Bell, Earthy,
Referee: O Langford (West Midlands).