Hull City 2 Blues 0 .. Report

Last updated : 27 February 2007 By Richard Barker
A desperately disappointing performance - undoutbtedly Blues' worst of the season, and there's been some competition - saw Blues return from Humberside following a 2-0 loss to relegation haunted Hull City.

Steve Bruce had promised to "freshen things up" and did so, bringing Neil Danns and DJ Campbell into the team at the expense of Fabrice Muamba and Nicklas Bendtner. There was still no Damien Johnson, so Seb Larsson continued on the right-hand side of midfield. He may think again before dropping - sorry, "resting" - his main men now though.

Right, I really, seriously don't think I want to go into details of the match, because there may be small children reading and some of the words I might choose to use could be somewhat choice. I'll stick to the fact that Windass scored from a Parlour cross amidst some dreadful Blues defending, then Radhi Jaidi was sent off for Blues for fouling someone clean through own goal (he seems to be making a habit of it) and then in the second half Windass made it 2-0 from the penalty spot after a blatant foul by Martin Taylor.

I know I say quite often, "this was dreadful", but seriously, this was dreadful. The sum total of Blues' efforts came down to a speculative Gary McSheffrey lob from about 35 yards out that went close, and that really and truly was it.

Anyway, far too often I go into detail about tactics (or lack of), team selections, players playing out of position, use of substitutions and all those kind of football-related things. For this game though, I want to delve deeper into the minds of the players and those who deal with them day in, day out. Where on earth was the motivation to win this football match? Where was the desire to get a result? Where was the desperation late on in the second half to try and get anything out of the game, or even to give themselves a sniff of picking up a point?

During the week, Blues had only drawn at home to Sunderland, but given the way that Sunderland played, given the way that the game had gone, and given the way that other results went it ended up looking a very good point. A last minute equaliser to get a good result should have everyone about the place buzzing and on a high - Blues had kept their position pretty much unchanged and were still in the driving seat to win the league after a tough home game. Did they come out at Hull looking as vibrant as you'd have expected? Not at all… from first minute to last they were outbattled, outfought, outplayed and generally outeverythinged. It was embarrassing at times - players were slipping over, knocking the ball into touch, miskicking, miscontrolling… it was humilating.

And what of Hull City's previous result going into this game? This team threatened by relegation to the division from whence they came not so long ago had gone to Barnsley in a genuine relagation 'six pointer' and been beaten 3-0 courtesy of goals from some random Hungarians no one has heard of. True, the nationality and reputation of the goalscorers isn't important, but the fact that Hull had been so comprehensively hammered by another rubbish team (and I'm sorry, Hull and Barnsley are both rubbish) should also have had Blues up and at it. Credit where credit's due, Hull bounced back well, but I don't care what anyone says, this Blues team had they been properly 'up for it' should have hammered another nail into Hull's coffin. They're crap and they know that they're crap, but they came up against a Blues side who showed about as much bottle as a milk carton and they were able to sweep them aside.

At half-time, after standing in shock at the developments of the first-half, you had the opportunity to sit and reflect on what had happened and have a think. For a minute I started to believe that Blues would at least create an opportunity or two, and it was just a case of making damn sure that it/they was/were taken. They didn't though - it was unbelievable. I don't care if you've got 11 men, 10 men, 8 men or 18 men - if you are chasing a game you should at least have one opportunity in 45 minutes. You have to be able to create something, don't you? Anything? A tame shot at the goalkeeper? Anything would have done.

It would be easy to criticise the poor performances of messrs Campbell, Jerome, Bendtner and Vine, but the truth is that they had no service whatsoever - nothing. The defence looked woeful - Bruno N'Gotty was being outjumped, outpaced and shown up, whilst in the middle the others didn't do much better, and Mat Sadler on the left looked awful. In midfield Neil Danns was horribly exposed as nothing better than a Colchester United midfielder, Stephen Clemence threw himself about a bit, but his actual contribution and distribution was poor, whilst Larsson and McSheffrey on the flanks looked like different players to how they looked six weeks ago. It was a frighteningly bad performance.

As I say, it would be easy enough to pinpoint things such as the bizarre substitution of apparent chief goal-threat DJ Campbell for Stephen Kelly when Blues were 1-0 and down to ten men. Surely Larsson could have helped out at right-back and you could have kept two strikers up front, including one who keeps scoring? But no, we had to have four defenders on the pitch, and so it was. Nothing against Kelly… when he came on his impressive energy levels meant that he did the full-back/winger role quite well, but why change it in that way? And then there was taking Larsson off and leaving Danns on. I've seen boulders more creative than Danns was, but at least with Larsson you've got someone who can create goals, especially now that you'd brought Bendtner on, and given that the two Scandanavians are both on the same wavelength. It would be easy enough to go through these things (and many others) and pinpoint them as factors, but the simple fact of the matter remains that IF Blues had been up for the game, and IF they'd put in 100% effort they'd have got a result, I'm certain of it. As I say, fair play to Hull - they'd have been wary of this game, but they saw that Blues weren't up for it at all and took advantage - that's all you can do, so well done to them.

It's unbelievable to think that Blues can go top of the league should they beat Leeds United this week in their game in hand. Some of the displays and results recently wouldn't suggest that at all. Still, nothing should be taken for granted, because it seems that everyone naturally raises their game when we play Sunderland or Albion or anyone in a "big" game, but when it comes to all the dross at the bottom of the league - and those teams are dross - surely there are people at the club who are paid to get the players up for those games too, even if it's not quite as glamorous. If Blues are going to continue to lose to the worst teams in the division, then they won't be top of the league after the Leeds game, because Leeds are THE worst team in the league. If you can't beat the current sides that the likes of Hull City, Ipswich Town, Southend United, Luton Town, Leeds United, etc, etc can put out, then to coin a topical phrase, you do have to question whether they really deserve promotion.