The Hull City manager, Steve Bruce, will be hoping this year’s transfer-deadline day is one he looks back on as the turning point in the club’s relegation fight.
This is not necessarily for the recruitment of players, mind you. Although there are deals in place for the Tottenham Hotspur winger Aaron Lennon and Dame N’Doye, Lokomotiv Moscow’s Senegal striker, subject to personal terms, the one definite arrival at their Cottingham training base is Mike Phelan as Bruce’s assistant. Hull have been without a managerial No2 since Steve Agnew switched to Middlesbrough before Christmas.
Phelan, Sir Alex Ferguson’s former sidekick at Manchester United whose most recent post was a brief one at Norwich City, played alongside Bruce at Carrow Road and Old Trafford although Bruce was keen to stress they are not overly matey.
“Mick was here for the game and he’s a vastly experienced man. It’s a new voice, somebody fresh with different ideas. I’m sure he’ll be a big help to us. I’ve known him a long time. I wouldn’t say I was pals with him but he’s the right man at the right time. He should give everyone a lift,” Bruce said.
How Hull and Bruce could do with one. They have taken only 20 points from their last 28 Premier League matches and the most worrying aspect of this defeat was its submissive nature. The better team for the opening 40 minutes, they fell away badly thereafter. For those who witnessed their performance in the 3-0 defeat at West Ham a fortnight ago it was Groundhog Day.
However, Bruce insisted last season’s FA Cup finalists will win the survival scrap they find themselves in. “I don’t fear for my job. It’s part and parcel, it’s my turn,” he said. “I’ve been in this game long enough to roll up my sleeves. The one thing I’m not going to do is chuck it in.
“I’ve had a great two and a half years here. We’ve been badly hit by injuries and we had too many flagging towards the end. We’ve got enough here to stay up and I’m convinced we will do.”
The need for points led Bruce to recall four players from the treatment room. Although he considered it a risk worth taking, two of them, Andrew Robertson and Gastón Ramírez, were culpable of giving away possession to Newcastle for their first two goals. Sumptuous long-range finishes from Rémy Cabella and Sammy Ameobi followed.
At the other end Abel Hernández and Nikica Jelavic failed to improve a woeful run of a dozen blanks in 16 matches although it took extraordinary bumble-footedness from the Croatian to bodge a 52nd-minute chance at an open goal.
A point worse off than they were at the same juncture of their 2009‑10 relegation season, Hull travel to Manchester City next weekend. Robertson, the Scotland full-back who apologised to his team-mates at half-time for his error, said: “Once you are in the relegation zone you can’t set any target. You have just to take it game by game and, if we want to stay in this league, we have to start winning.”
That is what John Carver managed for the first time in the week he had his role upgraded. After Yoann Gouffran became the ninth Newcastle substitute to score this season Alan Pardew’s successor as head coach said: “I’m known as the ‘grumpy one’ because when Alan was here I was getting around people, I was the bad cop. But I’m quite controlled now. If I’m brutally honest, my emotions are always in my face.”
At least one managerial son of the north-east is smiling.
Man of the match Rémy Cabella (Newcastle United)
