IF you ever find yourself in a position of coming face to face with a tiger in Hull, the best thing is to not alert them to your presence, writes Aidan Brown .
You must stay perfectly still, keep silent and pray. Ironically, this seems like the exact same tactic employed by Bolton’s back four this Saturday, however these Tigers took full advantage.
Going to Hull and back, is a lot more enjoyable than the famous Only Fools episode would have you think. The ground is new, easy to find, parking is simple and there was hardly any traffic when leaving the ground. The stadium itself is a bit on the small side, but when given three soft goals the atmosphere can be pretty intimidating.
I went over the Humber Bridge with little optimism, when the fixtures came out I saw wins all the way down the list, amazingly three games in and I was already thinking a draw would be a good result – a far cry from decent results at grounds like Stamford Bridge and Old Trafford.
Owen Coyle seems to do one of two things when naming his team – if the first team have been beaten the week before it's two changes, if they haven’t been beaten, it's likely to be the same team, but with the recent acquisition of Jay Spearing I wasn’t surprised to see him start. I was, however, by Ream's inclusion.
To me and a lot of Bolton fans, if we are going to use our strikers throughout the season, and if you could ever pick an occasion to not start Super Kev, then surely away from home in a 4-5-1 and up against a guy who knows Davies inside and out and can handle everything he throws at him would surely be the best time to do this. I am still a Davies fan but we all know that when he is over-played every week, he will get burnt out soon enough (as he did last season) so we need to use him when and where he will be most effective.
The first half was quite an average standard and moderately entertaining event, that for me showed very little between the two teams.
I felt Chris Eagles started poorly, pulling out of tackles, running balls out of play, giving soft and short passes to team mates and allowing the excellent Elmohamady to come forward at will, exposing the out-of-position Sam Ricketts throughout the entire game.
However, his speculative shot from distance was at the perfect angle for me to see the deflection very early on, and I was on my feet whilst the ball still had a good 15 yards to go. The moment it deflected there was no stopping it. This goal also had a positive impact on his own performance and he became our most dangerous player up until half time.
If the goal was positive for Eagles, it had an adverse effect on a few of the other players.
For me, Knight and Ricketts were terrible throughout but Ream and Andrews, who looked to have started well, soon started to give the ball away and both took large amount of the responsibility for conceding the equaliser.
Ream's poor clearance came back down their right, Ricketts was nowhere to be seen and that meant Andrews' poor attempt to defend a very weak cross left Ream to clear up, but instead turned into a stretch that did nothing more than bobble the ball to an unmarked striker who himself scuffed a shot of Mears and looped into the net.
Although the Championship may be entertaining and competitive, goals like this remind us how far away the premiership is.
With 15 minutes to prepare, organise, inspire, reflect, make decisions, encourage and prepare, it was frustrating that three minutes after the restart we are 3-1 down and it's game over.
Coyle has rightly come under severe criticism for some decisions made over the last 18 months, not just because the team has turned losing into their favourite pastime but because it’s the same mistakes over and over again.
Last year we were battered 0-5 at home against a half-hearted Manchester United team who employed the simple tactic of over-lapping a full back down their right hand side, and everytime they did this in the first half they scored. At the time we all blamed Robinson, but Coyle took about another 10 games to spot what fans had seen weeks before.
This is almost a carbon copy, however this time its Ricketts and this team the front line of Hull City weren’t as clinical as Man United. Rather than explain how and why the goals came about, we have seen the one minute of coverage and read the reports.
Both goals exposed the same weaknesses between Knight, Ream and Ricketts. Strangely at 3-1 down we went onto have our best 15 minutes of football that we have produced in a while, but was this because Hull had won or does it really take us to be that far behind before Mark Davies wants to receive the ball?
I am not a fan of his, but when he did start to get on the ball, burst five yards and make short quick passes, suddenly we looked a threat but after his and Ofobe’s misses and think the team decided they weren’t getting anything and fight back was extinguished just as it was beginning.
Admittedly, it’s been a while since Bolton attempted to hold out a two goal lead against any opposition (West Brom last season), but what I do remember about all of the times this has happened is, it tends to require a lot of clearing, heading, sitting back on the edge of your own box and defending for your life.
This was certainly not what Hull experienced when in the last 20 minutes we managed to emphatic total of one weak Sordell header, whilst the game petered out with a whimper.
I’m still yet to bring myself to chant ‘Coyle Out’ but my rational self thinks, do I really think he has the ability to turn this around? is he learning from his mistakes? is he trying new things? The answer to all of these things is 'no'.
I believe under Coyle his likeability and loyalty has created a losing culture at the club - a culture where under-performance is rewarded with you place in the team, and 12 months on the coaches are still preparing the team to allow them to make the same mistakes that took us down last year.
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