Six key Hull City tasks facing Ruben Selles in his first 100 days at the MKM Stadium

Ruben Selles met the media for the first time as Hull City's new head coach on Tuesday afternoon alongside owner Acun Ilicali and head of recruitment Jared Dublin, giving a positive first impression.

Selles is a passionate character and one who Ilicali believes is the man to lead the Tigers away from danger at the bottom end of the Championship table, and it's a sizeable one.

The Spaniard has inherited a team that struggles to score goals and has kept just one clean sheet in the first 19 games of the season. The stats, whichever way you dress them up, are bleak, and keeping City in the league is his biggest challenge now before he can consider cultivating anything more adventurous.

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Here, Hull Live looks at the biggest jobs facing the new Tigers head coach....

Create a connection

Former boss Liam Rosenior had a natural relationship with City's fans because he was a player at the club during its most successful period earlier this century, so that helped when he returned as manager. What Rosenior was great at was playing the PR game; he'd meet fans in the club shop, talk to them outside the stadium, and make them feel special. On a matchday, he'd do simple stuff like interact with the fans, and after wins, he'd get the crowd going. It helped create a connection between the fans and the club, and so when he called on them to be more understanding or give the team more backing, he'd get a positive response.

Tim Walter, however, didn't have anything to fall back on, and because of his cold, abrasive nature, he never allowed himself to build a connection with the supporters. And so when he made comments about the backing, or lack of, against Portsmouth, the fans turned, and then instead of trying to smooth it over, he doubled down and made it worse.

And because of that, with results poor and the style of football coma-inducing instead of being anything like an attack, they turned on him, and he had nowhere to go. Selles, we know from his time at Reading, is a good communicator. He's passionate and takes the fans with him.

Getting City's fans on board and behind him and the team won't be a problem. They crave that connection, and Selles can generate a very easy win by creating that relationship. Ultimately, performances and results will dictate it, but his manner will go a long way.

Change the approach

Under both City's two former managers, there was an element of keeping the ball for keeping the ball's sake. At times, especially under Walter, the ball was being passed around for the sake of it; they went nowhere with it and just invited pressure on themselves, lacking the clarity of how to get out of trouble.

Nothing bores fans more than players passing it sideways and without any real conviction. It's easy to defend against and it turns the crowd off. Almost every game this season, especially at home, City have gone from the kick-off, all the way back to the goalkeeper and then invaraobly lost the ball, and conceded a chance from it.

Selles will be keen to get his side playing positively, on the front foot and spending less time faffing about near their own goal for absolutely no reward, and instead, want his team to play in areas where they can hurt the opposition, not ones where they hurt themselves.

Give them confidence

City's players have lacked confidence all season. They look like a team, and a group of individuals bereft of confidence and belief in what they can do. Again, a bit like the connection with the fans, this is a very easy win for Selles, and something Walter couldn't do.

The squad might be nowhere near the level of last season, but it does have talented players. The likes of Mason Burstow and Abu Kamara are bright prospects, but they're young. They need support, belief and trust from their head coach. At Reading, Selles built a really good reputation for the way he worked with players, especially youngsters.

There are some good young players at his disposal; Charlie Hughes, Gustavo Puerta, Will Jarvis, Burstow, Kamara, Xavier Simons, Fin Burns et all, and he will need them if he's to get the Tigers out of the mud as Steven Alzate described it perfectly as.

While the young players are talented but need support and confidence, there are some very good more senior pros at City, like Lewie Coyle, Alfie Jones, Regan Slater, Ryan Giles, Cody Drameh and Joao Pedro. Selles must work with them, lean on them and use their experience to support him and the youngsters.

He won't have a huge amount of time on the training pitch until the next international break in March, so he will have to judge how to get his point across, drip-feeding information in during the limited amount of training sessions he'll have in between games and recovery sessions.

Stop the goals

It goes without saying when you're bottom, that generally, you struggle to score and can't keep the ball out of the net at the other end, and that's certainly been the case at City. They have the worst defence in the league, and while there's only been one hammering (at Norwich City - 4-0), most of their defeats have been by the odd goal. That shows they're in most games and not being blown away, but their inability to keep shut-outs has been a real problem.

One clean sheet in 19 games tells it's own story, and Selles will be keen to make them tougher to create chances and score against. At Boro, who, admittedly, are a good attacking side, they conceded 21 attempts on their goal, and that's too many.

Selles will need to find the balance between being a threat at one end, and tight and compact at the other. Basically, as we've said before, he needs to do what Liam Rosenior did two years ago with City in a similar position, and that's start keep the ball out of their net first and foremost, to give yourselves a chance.

Look a threat

There may be no Liam Millar and Mohamed Belloumi to call upon for the rest of the season, but City still have some attacking players capable of causing problems. Kasey Palmer showed against Rovers what a threat he can be if he's deployed in the right position and given the ball.

The problem on Saturday was that Palmer was the only one who really carried any kind of threat in the final third. Abu Kamara struggled, Abdus Omur isn't performing and Ryan Longman is still working his way back to fitness. Chris Bedia looks way off the standard required, while Joao Pedro is 32 and, at times, with the greatest respect, looks it.

Burstow is a player with potential, but will need a run of games as the number nine, if City are to get the best out of him and he will have to prove he's capable of scoring goals consistency at this level.

If City are to get out of this, they're going to have to start finding the back of the net with some regularity, and bar the three wins where they scored ten goals in three games (with Millar and Belloumi in their side), they haven't managed more than one in any games, and that will simply have to change.

January is big

It goes without saying, what the club do next month will be absolutely pivotal. Selles will need reinforcements, especially up front, but City have work to do.

Their squad is at the limit of the EFL's allowance, so they'll need to move players on to free up space in an already bloated squad, and no doubt, Selles will want to lessen the number in that bulging squad. One quick way of freeing up space will be to de-register Millar, Belloumi and Oscar Zambrano, none of whom will play again this season.

We know the number six is a key area for improvement, but it's upfront where they'll be judged. The summer wasn't good enough, while last January cost them, and that can't be allowed to happen again ;otherwise, the ramifications could be disastrous.

One key issue City will have is attracting the right players for the right reasons. Twelve months ago, their task was much easier because they were chasing promotion to the Premier League. At this juncture, they're facing a battle to stay in the Championship, and because of that, you may well be shopping in a very different pond and that creates its own challenges.