Next move key for Hull City to ensure 'enjoyable' end to terrible Championship season
Hull City have the chance to make the end of a difficult season an enjoyable one if they can bag two wins in the next two Championship games.
That's according to former Premier League footballer and Hull-born David Prutton, who watched City ease to a hugely significant 1-0 win at promotion-chasing Sunderland on Saturday, with the Tigers now preparing for two mammoth encounters against fellow strugglers Cardiff City and Plymouth Argyle in the next week.
City's successes in the North East, coupled with favourable results elsewhere, meant the Tigers moved three points clear of the relegation zone, the furthest clear they've been since November, and that would become six on Tuesday night, should Ruben Selles' men secure a fifth away win in the past six games.
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The omens are good for City, who have won their last seven against the Bluebirds, including their last three trips to the Cardiff City Stadium, while the South Wales club have the worst home record in the league, aside from the Tigers.
Prutton also feels Selles should stick with the same starting XI who performed so well on Wearside, pending the availability of Charlie Hughes and Louie Barry, and that victory in Cardiff and then at home to Plymouth Argyle next Tuesday night would see them go a long way towards making the final few games an enjoyable, rather than stressful period.
"You keep it the same," Prutton said on the 1904 Club podcast. "You find out who can fill in for Louie and how much you can get him in the ten because Louie's there as a creative responsibility for City.
"That old cliche of being in the engine room, what you do, and it gives me a very vague memory of doing it a long time ago given how quickly these games come; it's brilliant because you play the game, you travel, but you're not sat on a double-decker bus cramped up. You're well looked after, you're well fed and watered, and you go again.
"All that matters is what you feel like at quarter to eight tomorrow (Tuesday) night. It's brilliant, and it sounds very, very selfish, which, to a certain point, all footballers are, but you're in a little bubble. Get these couple of games done, and maybe have a couple of days off. All that type of stuff, these little carrots that are dangled for players as well as being paid thousands and thousands of pounds.
"It's great, and we go again. We got something from Sunderland; we got a big result at Sunderland. Expectation from the outside looking in is that City should go to Cardiff and get something, given how good they've been recently against them.
"The challenge now is to do that and give us a bit more breathing space at the bottom to try and make it relatively enjoyable as you head into single-digit games between now and the end of the season, meander your way up the table. There might be a step forward and half a step back, but the games now are the most important thing. It should be a really nice vibe in and around what they're doing."
You can listen to the latest episode of the 1904 Club via the links below....
