Hull City’s strange, but successful, season

Courtesy of the Marcus Dysch 'Dared to Dream' blog...

As the final whistle on Hull City’s 2011/12 season nears, you might expect fans to be rejoicing at one of the club’s most successful campaigns in a generation.

The previous nine months have seen many of the usual trials and tribulations – perhaps the most pressing of which was the departure of manager Nigel Pearson in November. His move threatened to seriously rock the boat and scupper the Tigers’ promising start to the season.

But City came through it – new gaffer Nick Barmby performed admirably in taking on a side he had not built and, with no prior experience of management whatsoever, steered them to not only a top half outcome but one that only narrowly missed the play-offs. Saturday’s match at West Ham United has fewer consequences for the visitors than the home side. Regardless of the result, City can now only realistically finish seventh or eighth.

That outcome represents not only an improvement on last season, but the fourth best finish by the club in the 22 or so years I have been following them, bettered only by the two Premier League campaigns and the preceding promotion season. Realistically it is the best we could have hoped for. Promotion would have come too soon. A mid-table finish would be below what the players’ tenacity and coaching team’s dedication deserved. So where are the celebrations?

Some level-headed Tigers’ fans understand the challenges the club continues to face and are quietly content with how things have turned out. Not a fantastic season, true, but a satisfying one in many ways. Finishing above Leicester after Pearson’s decampment is worth a wry smile, if not a full belly laugh perhaps. Likewise, ending as the top team in Yorkshire is no small feat. Yet still there is a level of moaning from some “fans” that seems to go way beyond even what could be expected from a collection of Yorkshire folk.

I had at one point intended to highlight the views of some numbskulls on Twitter and local radio phone-ins who call not only for Barmby’s dismissal, but quite ludicrously attack the Allams for not pouring more of their (admittedly substantial) personal fortune into the club. (Incidentally, the financial fair play rules adopted by the Football League this week show why the approach favoured by many City fans is suicidal for so many professional clubs.)

Anyway, in the end I have decided not to dissect this at greater length, as many of those views are just that – personal opinions from people who are clearly of limited intelligence and who in many cases have not the slightest idea of what the club and its fans went through in the 1990s and early 2000s.

I would rather see City play in the lower tiers of English football for the rest of my life than go through a couple of seasons in the top flight and then go out of business. Financial security must now and for the future be the number one objective for City, even above that of promotion.

There are some concerns associated with the Allams – not least that the family obviously know little about the intricacies of the game on the field. Assem Allam has admitted he is not a football fan, and his claim in a recent poor BBC TV interview that he takes most pride in seeing 18,000 people enjoying themselves in the stadium on a Saturday afternoon was a fairly bizarre one. The KC remains almost utterly devoid of atmosphere, an issue which must hamper the players and thus the club’s fortunes. I’d also suggest that Mr Allam might well struggle to pick Joe Dudgeon, Corry Evans or indeed any other City player out of a line-up.

That isn’t a problem for as long as Adam Pearson remains at the club. He and Barmby are clearly close, and in some ways it could be argued they are mutually-dependent on each other for their respective jobs. I don’t see Pearson’s ownership of Hull FC as a substantial problem. On at least one day when the two clubs’ matches have clashed, he has picked watching the club that employs him over the one he owns – a positive sign.

Pearson’s potential departure remains as terrifying now as at almost any point in his time with the club, not least because of the Allams’ aforementioned footballing deficiencies.

Admittedly, having had the worst season attendance wise-in my City career (I think I saw perhaps only five games live due to other commitments), I am not in a position to honestly comment on individual player performances. But the various achievements and failings are clear.

Only two wins in a tortuous February and March, and a run of first five consecutive draws and then five consecutive defeats did for the play-off push – and came at the worst possible time. The squad is woefully short of both strength in depth and the experienced heads and touch of class needed to get out of what is often regarded as the toughest, most competitive division in Europe. Barmby himself has been a considerable loss on the field since he took up his permanent role in the dug-out. But he could not have continued to play forever. A longer-term solution is needed.

Some may regard Robert Koren picking up the player-of-the-season award as a surprise, but the fact the side won only one game without him, losing the other six in which he did not play, says a lot. It is essential he stays this summer.

Jack Hobbs and James Chester incredibly played every minute of the league season from August to the end of March, winning 40 per cent of those matches. An admirable record in anyone’s books. Hobbs’ devastating injury, which will probably rule him out until Christmas, means he is unlikely to leave in the summer. Losing Chester would be a huge blow, but one that the progress of Liam Cooper suggests City might overcome more easily than it would once have been thought.

No doubt there will be some summer focus on the futures of Cameron Stewart (yet again linked with Leicester this week) and Matty Fryatt. The latter would clearly be a significant loss. His 16 goals in 45 games is a reasonable return, but also an indispensible one for terminally goal-shy City. It would take money we don’t have to replace him. As for Stewart – you know the old adage, “form is temporary, class is permanent”. The tricky winger clearly has plenty of class, but if his form does not improve in August then his place in the side will remain in question. A sizeable offer may well test the Allams more now than it did in January.

Beyond Fryatt and Koren, goals were few and far between in the side. Another goal-scoring striker is essential, but will of course be hard to come by.

As has been widely speculated, much will depend on the finances available to the manager.

With the Allams remaining tight-lipped about how much Barmby will have to spend, it is hard to know exactly where things stand. As Leicester so amusingly highlighted this season, vast spending power is absolutely no guarantee of success in this league. City have almost as much chance of a promising 2012/13 season without shelling out millions as they would with serious financial investment in the side. Nous is worth just as much as cash.

Of course, Barmby will remain severely hampered by the remaining ridiculous contracts sprayed around by the incompetent previous owners. I would suggest that, wherever possible, players who can’t be moved on due to their sickeningly high salaries should be used in the first team squad. If Barmby prefers to leave them out then he will have to stomach the financial consequences that incurs. There seems little point in paying huge wages to Seyi Olofinjana, for example, if he is only rarely to be given a run out.

It seems little will change in the financial arena though, and so it likely that Pearson and Barmby will be working largely, as Pearson has suggested, in the free transfer and Bosman markets this summer. There are bargains to be had. It is often said that the manager’s experience and style of football will lead players to City’s door. There was a suggestion earlier in the month that players were indeed already knocking on it, offering their services. If after the summer a more robust, experienced, quality-packed squad has been built – by whatever financial means – and the nucleus of this year’s squad remains, then you would have to argue that City could look forward to another positive season to come.

But make no mistake, next year’s Championship will be as tough as ever. Already-relegated Wolves will be joined by at least two of Blackburn, Bolton, Wigan, QPR and, intriguingly, perhaps Aston Villa. At least the last two of those would probably spend heavily upon relegation in an attempt to bounce straight back.

The Championship will also keep four of Southampton, West Ham, Blackpool, Birmingham, Cardiff and Middlesbrough. Again, whichever teams fail in their promotion efforts will be desperate to perform admirably again come August and would pose a threat to City.

Should we be considered among the contenders? After the successes in the face of adversity of these past two seasons you would have to say yes – for the play-offs at least.

Tigers’ fans simply have to accept that for now, and perhaps the considerable future, Barmby will continue to build a squad of largely young, promising players, and attempt to mould them to his style and systems. As has so often been shown in football, more haste and less speed brings results. Swansea fans have recently reaped the benefits of patience. Let us hope that 2012/13 brings some new-found sense to our fellow City fans.

With a bit of good fortune and a lot of graft, the Tigers will be there or thereabouts again. When you remember how close we came to losing our club altogether, and how recently that was, it seems unreasonable to ask for a great deal more than that.

 

He can see into the future...