—Hull City AFC’s first ever encounter with the top tier of English football hasn’t been what everyone expected
On the 24th May 2008, after what had been one of the most successful seasons on record, Hull City AFC won the Coca-Cola Championship Play-Off Final and booked themselves a place in the 2008/09 English Premier League. Before the start of the 2008/09 English Premier League the highest position
Hull City had finished in the English Football League was 3rd in the old second division back in the 1909–10 season.
To the hundreds of thousands of Hull City fans, of which around 44,000 attended the match, 24th May 2008 was to become the greatest in the club’s history to date, and sparked off celebrations which have never been seen around the city. For many years the club has lounged around in the mediocrity that has infested the middle tiers of English Football, and the club has rarely threatened to flirt with promotion.
With 38 managers to date, at an average of two-and-a half years per manager, Hull City have yet to have the rare opportunity in modern football of having time to allow the manager to build a club due to flirtations with relegation and the stalemate that countless finishes in mid-table positions brings. However, having won promotion into the top tier of English football, and a reported massive £60m windfall that this brings, Phil Brown has been given the opportunity to build a team which is capable of giving Hull City some credibility in the Premier League and, at best, avoiding relegation.
Promoted alongside West Bromwich Albion and Stoke FC, of which only the former have had any recent Premier League experience, Hull City were given little chance of even matching Derby’s points total last season, the lowest ever recorded in Premier League History. However, with a strong contingent of British players and some flair and creativity added in the form of Brazilian Geovanni, Hungarian Halmosi and Marlon King from Jamaica this side had something to prove.
Suffering a 5-0 defeat at home against fellow relegation candidates Wigan Athletic FC is typical of the results many people would have associated with Hull City AFC this season. In fact they were wrong. A strong start to the season saw a 2-1 home victory against Fulham and then a 1-1 away draw against a stubborn Blackburn Rovers team. Beginner’s luck was the buzzword around the Premier League when people commented about the start Hull City had made, and after the hammering they took against Wigan at home many pundits thought that the reality of being in the Premier League would hit home.
Many teams like to get stuck into the next game straight away and get a bad loss out of their system. Hull City couldn’t afford this luxury and after the 5-0 hammering what ultimately awaited them was a two-week international break. For most teams this loss could have defined their season, and for Hull it probably has, but not in the shape that many had expected. When they returned on Saturday 13th September against a Newcastle side that has recently resembled a circus more than a football team, they started what was to become a magical, and probably the most successful, four weeks of their history.
A 2-1 away win at Newcastle was then followed up with a 2-2 draw at the KC Stadium against Everton, who after last season’s performances were expected to challenge the top four this time around. Many people started to sit up and realise that Phil Brown was creating a team that could not only stand their ground against better opposition, but also out compete them. The mighty Tigers were to visit London for their next two fixtures, and although heroic performances against Newcastle and Everton could be used as evidence, they were not given much chance of continuing the run against an
Arsenal team that had not quite kicked off their season yet, and a Spurs team that, despite taking Newcastle’s ‘big-top and clowns’ attitude to football, still had roughly £80m of quality running throughout their team.
At 5.30pm on Saturday 27th September the City of Hull gathered around any available TV which was showing the game to watch the biggest match this season for Hull City. Even the most optimistic fans expected the fluid and expansive type of football Arsenal have come to trademark to be too much for an in-form Hull City. Many had likened what they were about to watch to some gory depiction of lambs to the slaughter. In fact, what they saw was an efficient display which thwarted that fluid and expansive style of football and, thanks to a 30 yard beauty from Brazilian ‘superstar’ Geovanni, Hull
surprised the entire Football League with a 2-1 away win at what had become fortress Emirates.
Hull City fans were now in dreamland, and a high had been reached which could not have been foreseen at the start of the season; if you had offered Phil Brown just 1 point from the two fixtures against Arsenal at the start of the season then he would have taken it! Amongst the footballing community this result was seen as a fluke and one which, given the domination Arsenal had in the game, would not be repeated. However, the weekend after the surprise win away at Arsenal Hull had
to visit London again, and every Hull fan was dreaming of another away day victory, however unlikely it would be.
With Tottenham struggling for form and any kind of normality around the club, this was a good time to play them. Hull City put in a better showing this time in London and yet again, against everyone’s predictions, they came away from White Hart Lane with all 3 points courtesy of a 1-0 victory. Again, it was down the Brazilian ‘superstar’ Geovanni who managed to put the ball where many people would struggle to put a postage stamp. This victory against Spurs has shown some people that the victory against Arsenal wasn’t just a fluke, and that this Hull City team truly has something special about them.
Although we’re only seven games into the season, Hull City are sitting 3rd in the League, just behind Liverpool and Chelsea. Who’d have predicted that at the start of the season!? It will be difficult for Hull to maintain their impressive form and carry it through the season, however, they have given
themselves the best possible start and a real platform to launch a survival attempt on the Premier League. Let’s all hope this season doesn’t mirror the likes of Ipswich Town and Reading!
Nick Stobbs
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