Liam Rosenior delighted by Hull City's character in 'biggest win of the season by far'

Scoring with their first two shots of the game, the Tigers raced into an early 2-0 lead at home to Blackburn Rovers but the visitors were level at half-time having also hit the post and Liam Delap's second goal of the night was all that was between the sides at full-time despite Dominic Hyam receiving a second yellow card in the 74th minute.

For Blackburn to end the half on level terms after goals from Sam Szmodics and Harry Pickering cancelled out those for Delap and Aaron Connolly was a fair reflection but given how much coach Rosenior has been forced to talk about ruthlessness in a December of four defeats, he was frustrated to see it go missing again at 2-0.

Overall, though, he ended his footballing year in good heart as his team ended it in the top-six Championship places which are their target for May on the back of a 3-2 win which answered some of the questions about character this month’s defeats might have raised.

"I have to say I'm so happy we don't have to play Blackburn again this season, I think they're a credit to Jon (Dahl Tomasson, their manager)," said Rosenior. "I think they're an outstanding young team and it made for a really good football match.

"We needed to win the game in a different way, we set up with a narrow diamond playing Liam and Aaron up front (he changed it after the break), knowing it would probably entice them on to and give us more space in transition – that's where the two goals came from.

"Then the first half kind of sums up our season, to be honest – we're in control and we shoot ourselves in the foot, a cheap giveaway, one ball in transition and we know Szmodics can do what he did, it was a fantastic finish.

"We're still in control of the game a minute before half-time and Tyler Morton tries a Cruyff turn halfway inside our own half a minute before half-time, we lose possession and they go 2-2. It takes a minor deflection off Lewie (Coyle) so it's a really tough one for Matty (Ingram) to save.

"But then I was really pleased because we came in at half-time and there were a lot of frustrated player in there having been 2-0 up and I just had to regather the players and say to them the reality of the situation was it was 2-2 and we'd had so many good chances in transition, we just needed to be really organised and keep a clean sheet in the second half and we'd win the game.

"Credit to the players, they went out there and did it."

Tomasson admitted to mixed emotions at full-time.

"First of all (I was) disappointed to lose the game, of course disappointed with the goals we conceded - the first two, nothing to do with shape, we had spare players and we'd spoken about those balls in behind," he said.

"But also being two down we showed good resilience and at 2-2 we should go for the game.

"The second half was a very equal game.

"I must admit the players have done a lot of good things against a very good side."

On Hyam's two yellow cards – 15 minutes apart – he would only say: "I'm actually complaining about a referee every week so I'd rather stay quiet, to be honest."