FA Cup: How a rallying call and a few home truths helped spur the Tigers through to final

With Hull City trailing to Sheffield United in last month’s FA Cup semi-final, Curtis Davies saw it as the captain’s prerogative to deliver a few home truths.

The result was a 2-1 half-time deficit being transformed into a 5-3 victory and Steve Bruce using his own post-match press conference to hail his captain’s intervention.

Asked about the Wembley dressing down, Davies seems initially embarrassed before warming to the theme.

“It came naturally to me,” he said. “I am not a quiet captain. I am loud. But I am also quite forgiving. I am more of a friend who will gee his mates up, say the right thing to the right person and so on.

“But, at that point, it wasn’t about people making mistakes. We were a shambles. They were working harder than us. That can never happen.

“That is why I said what I did. I have said things a few times but sometimes that is just to individuals. I don’t want anyone to think that every time we are losing, I am in there tearing a strip off people.

“If I started thinking, ‘I must shout, as that got a reaction’, well, it wouldn’t work because it wouldn’t be natural. I only did what I did because we were poor. We’d just got back into the game at 1-0 but then conceded again.

“If we had gone in at 1-1, it would have been a similar team-talk with a lower key to it. But we couldn’t stay solid and they scored straight away and I was bubbling as I got back into the dressing room. It all came out.”

Will there be a repeat tomorrow? “I hope not. I am hoping we will be in a comfortable position. Plus, you have to take each game on its own. With Arsenal at home, we were 2-0 down but we had played well. I don’t feel we were far off it. So, there was no point shouting at anyone just because we were 2-0 down. They had scored through two pieces of magic.”