The HDM talks…! – EXCLUSIVE

As part of our wish to bring different and interesting City stories at Vital Hull, we decided to go and find out what the major source of printed City news, the Hull Daily Mail, actually think about the issues surrounding the club. Stuart Rowson, the sports editor – a man in the past not afraid of facing difficult issues and controversy – met some of the VF team to answer questions…

Vital Football: As a major player within the sporting community of Hull, what do you perceive your role to be?

Stuart Rowson: Simple one really. To deliver independent, accurate, fair and balanced news on every level of sport in Hull and East Yorkshire. It’s also our job to act as a social commentator within the sporting world – if something’s crap, then we need to say it is.

VF: Given as how there is a large degree of sporting politics of one form or another within the city, how have you found dealing with them, there being so many differing factions within the community?

SR: It’s part of the job. Everyone has an opinion and the fact that there are so many rival factions in Hull makes the job more entertaining. I used to work in Grimsby for example, where the level of banter is zero, because there is only club. The fact that there is the football v rugby thing going on, and the club rivalry just makes life interesting.

VF: Amongst sections of the fans of all the major clubs within Hull, there is a perception that the paper is biased against each of them in turn. Do you think that is fair? And what would your response be?

SR: Within every town and city up and down the country, there are always people who think that the local paper is either crap, or biased. That’s fair enough, and you can’t expect everyone to be devotees of the local paper. But we always try to be fair, balanced and accurate. Every week people accuse me of supporting Rovers, Hull or City and hating the rest. The truth is that, from a fans’ point of view, I’m from Grimsby and don’t support any of the three. I’m a Man United fan and my missus and kids have taken a shine to Hull FC – but I don’t have an allegiance on this side of the water. The truth is that as sports editor of the local paper, I want all of the teams to do well because it’s good for the paper, the city and the fans. That’s what I get paid for.

VF: At times the papers relationship with Hull City has been fractious, and therefore made it difficult to bring the news from inside the club. How easy has it been to improve that, giving the fans what they want to know?

SR: There has never really been a major breakdown relations with the sportsdesk and the Tigers. During the last row, over KCfm, it was a corporate argument that levels higher than myself. The sportsdesk stayed out of it, and just continued to cover the club the best it could. We’ve got a good relationship with Adam Pearson, the manager and the players. It’s always difficult to find out everything, but I reckon we do better than most – and people in Hull certainly get more column inches about their club than most other regional newspapers devote to their main footy club.

VF: One question that I know you can’t or won’t answer but I will try it, how likely do you think that the sizable investment/takeover being from sources within the Hull and East Riding area? What the fans will not want is someone coming in from outside, with no football nous and just out to make a profit every year.

SR: I think it’s fairly doubtful if I’m honest. I can understand why local fans would want local money, but I think there’s more chance of it coming from down south. Adam Pearson will remain as chairman which the most important thing, and any investor who comes in will want to see some form of return for his money. That doesn’t necessarily mean they’ll drain the club dry, and often the kudos of being involved with a club is enough. Let’s face it, Adam has rescued the club from oblivion once. He won’t let it go that way again.

VF: This question is probably better answered by Phil Buckingham but what seems to be the issues within the squad with Michael Bridges? In a time when the club needed a player of his ability on the field, he couldn’t seem to ever break in to the first team.

SR: Michael Bridges is an interesting one. He had problems early in the season when his children are ill and he suffered from injury and I think that inevitably would have had a knock-on effect. His problem though, is that maybe he doesn’t fit into the 4-3-3 formation Brown chose to adopt. And, if he did, there is the certain names of Barmby and Windass to worry about. If he does leave, I’m certain he’ll prove his worth. So far, he’s been a victim of circumstance.

VF: Finally, and I know we touched on this before we started, but were you surprised by the response of your posts about the new SportHull section on the CityIndependent board?

SR: Not really. Sport is about opinion, forgive the cliche. People are allowed to think I’m a tosspot, and people are allowed to say the Mail is crap. Maybe an equal amount of people would say otherwise – then again, maybe they wouldn’t. That’s life. The Mail isn’t a propaganda newsletter for anyone, and some fans of whatever sport have difficulty with that. But the Mail isn’t perfect, it just does its best. The Mail’s job is about reporting on the news in a balanced, fair and accurate way. As long as we strive to do that, then we won’t go far wrong. We can’t afford to be complacent given the growing media competition out there but I would think we are still the main source for Hull City news and information for most people. Sometimes we might miss a story, and on other occasions we’ll be first with them.

Many thanks for sparing the time to talk to us, Stuart. No doubt others will accuse VF of dancing to the HDM’s tune…