City 1 Hull 1
My last match report for the Trust was written just eleven weeks ago, for the friendly against Sunderland. Fans were looking forward to the first home match under a potentially charismatic foreign manager, to seeing new signings, and to welcoming an old favourite back to the Walkers.
You could argue that nothing much changes: replace Ericsson for Sousa, Naughton and Davies for Lamey, and Pearson for Waghorn and the, erm, stability of Leicester City continues on its merry way.
The world, of course, was here to see Sven – and the 2,000 masks handed out before kick-off together with the presence of Swedish TV hinted that things will not be quite the same under our new celebrity “gaffer”.
Sensibly, Ericsson has said he will wait before making major signings, but equally sensibly he has already tapped the loan market for two new defenders – the aforementioned Naughton and Davies – both of whom started. The remainder of the team was familiar Pearson-era: Weale in goal, Hobbs and Berner as the left-side defenders, Oakley, King, Wellens and Gallagher across the middle, with Howard and Waghorn up front. Oddly, there were no strikers on the City bench…..
Hull also lined up in a 4-4-2 formation, with the giant Folan matched against centre-back Davies.
City started brightly, as they have most home games this season. This time, however, they got something to show for it, with King scoring after a couple of minutes. A neat flick from the outside of Oakley’s boot found King completely unmarked on the edge of the penalty area, he took the ball into the box and hit his shot directly at the keeper, who somehow managed only to parry it into the goal. 1-0 to City: let the Sven era begin!
The goal came so early that it allowed City fans managed to sing “Pearson, what’s the score?” even before they later followed up with a chorus of “There’s only one Nigel Pearson”.
City dominated the first 25 minutes – once again, as they have several times this season. Davies was outstanding in the air at centre-back, and Naughton looked particularly good going forward – regularly overlapping well outside Oakley. Hull looked slow in midfield, and posed little threat other than speculative through-balls for their strikers to chase.
Slowly, City’s pace and dominance fizzled out. The Hull defenders took full advantage of a very lenient referee to ensure that Howard barely won a header. (To be fair, Mr Miller was equally lenient to both sides), and they also swapped over their strikers, so that Folan got a little more of the ball against Hobbs.
Just before half-time, McShane limped off to be replaced by Solano, who got a deserved cheer from both sets of fans.
Half-time came with City still the better side, but few clear-cut chances to either side.
As so often happens, the second half started like a mirror image of the first. Hull came out looking lively, and City were slow, error-prone and defending far too deeply. It took only six minutes for the near-inevitable to happen – an equaliser to Hull. The ball broke innocuously outside City’s box and Koren hit a low hard shot to Weale’s right. The keeper got a hand to it, but could only divert it into the corner of his goal: 1-1.
Hull were the better side now, creating a number of chances, whilst City looked slow in the build-up. Ericsson tried to liven things up by replacing the ineffectual Howard with Moussa, and then Oakley with Abi. Gallagher was pushed forward into a striker position with Moussa taking the wide-left spot. These changes perked City up for a while, and the match settled into a period when neither side had the upper hand. Hull looked threatening, particularly from set pieces, but City occasionally put together neat passing moves which, unfortunately, threatened more than they delivered.
Both sides could point to chances which might have led to a winner, with Gallagher blazing over from near the penalty spot following a scrambled corner being probably City’s best chance.
In the end, it was 1-1: a fair result over the full 90 minutes.
So, how is the Ericsson era so far? Well, obviously it is far too soon to make any firm judgments, but some first observations:
– The two new loan signings looked impressive, that is a useful omen if further new signings are on their way.
– The team passed and moved very well in the first half (as they did often under Sousa).
– But they still looked vulnerable as soon as the equaliser went in (also as under Sousa).
I was going to write that Hull looked like a typical well-drilled Pearson side: grinding out an efficient away point after initially looking outclassed. I then remembered that last season they were in the Premiership and probably aspire to be better than that. Well, they look like numerous other Championship sides now, I’m afraid.
A final thought: when the City match day programme in 2060 runs an article focussing on supporters’ collections of memorabilia, will a slightly tatty mask of Sven Goran Ericsson take pride of place?
City: Weale, Berner, Naughton, Davies, Hobbs, Oakley (Abi 73), King, Wellens, Gallagher, Howard (Moussa 66), Waghorn. Subs: Logan, Neilson, Morrison, Kennedy, Moreno, Abi, Moussa
Hull: Duke, Dawson, McShane (Solano 44), Gerrard, Ayala, Cairney, Koren, Garcia (Kilbane 76), Folan, Cullen, Vine (Barmby 70). Subs: Oxley, Ashbee, Kilbane, Bostock, Barmby, Solano, Simpson
The views expressed in this report are the opinions of the Trust member nominated to file the report only and do not represent the views of the Foxes Trust organisation