It's 'up for grabs' for 'underdogs' Hull City, insists vice-captain Jacob Greaves

The Tigers were rarely out of the headlines for the rest of 2022, with the bold proclamations of the Turkish media mogul being an immediate attention-grabber, allied to some generosity towards supporters which helped the club re-engage with the East Yorkshire public after the fissures of the final Allam years.

Some headline arrivals from the continent in the summer window added to the feeling that Hull were becoming box office again, certainly in Championship circles.

In recent times, the noise and sense of fanfare has died down somewhat. Some would say that's not necessarily a bad thing.

Liam Rosenior arrived in November and he and his players have been getting their heads down at City's Cottingham training ground since.

After looking over their shoulders for most of the first half of 2022-23, Hull - who have been beaten once in nine league games under Rosenior - are starting to look upwards.

Positioned in 16th in the table, they are closer to the play-offs than the relegation zone. Seven points separate them from the team currently in the final play-off spot in West Brom with 19 matches left.

If Hull are to progress, they should have the benefit of slipping under the radar at least.

Defender Jacob Greaves. preparing for Friday's Yorkshire derby at second-placed Sheffield United, said: "I think everyone is looking at the league table, although you prefer looking at it after a win, which is pretty normal for anyone. If we keep winning, we can close that gap between the play-offs.

"There's two teams who are up there and favourites for automatic and then the rest is up for anyone's grabs really. If you have a little run, you never know where that might take you.

"Sometimes, it's nice to have that underdog mentality. Not many teams will expect us to go climbing the table. But I think with the group and mentality and changing room we have got, we don't want to be down there, but looking up. I still think we can go on and do that."

Hull's run without a win on home soil extended to an eighth game against Huddersfield Town on Saturday.

For Rosenior and his squad, there is an understandable desire to focus on their fact that City are much harder to beat these days.

They boast an unbeaten six-match league run. Should they turn a few more draws into wins, then they might have some fun yet.

Despite their sticky first half of the season, the fact that supporters have kept with them is also significant.

Hull-born Greaves continued: "Hopefully the more we settle down and win games, the better it will be.

"We’ve gone through that honeymoon phase really well and got a lot of the fans back on our side. There were nearly 18,000 on Saturday which was fantastic and hopefully we can keep building that as well as I know there's still fans to come back.

"When the effort is, the fans are always quite happy and will clap us off. When they feel like we have not really worked hard, then they have probably got a right to be a little bit angry."