Hull City gaffer Nigel Adkins has spoken of his delight at seeing the side take victory over Blackburn Rovers last weekend, especially as we kept a clean sheet in the process.
Heading to Ewood Park for the FA Cup third round tie, an Ola Aina second half goal just ahead of the hour mark was enough to give us victory and speaking to the Official Site as he met with the media post game, Adkins was delighted to see us through to the fourth round draw.
‘It was good. We played against a good side at the top end of their division. Both sides made a few changes and I thought we played some exquisite football for 35 minutes of the first half. It was great to have Evandro on the pitch and you can see the ability and talent that he has. We were just missing that final thing of putting the ball in the back of the net. We scored from a set-play in the second half and then Blackburn put Danny Graham on and were a bit more threatening. We had to show some resilience to see the game out – we did that and it was great.’
Adkins went on to say.
‘David Marshall played his first game of the season, kept a clean sheet and looked assured. Diomande got a game under his belt and other players got a game as well which can only strengthen the group, and the spirit is there for all to see. I said to the players afterwards to enjoy winning a game of football. The supporters were great and got right behind the players all the way through which is important, and we`re on a cup run now.’
Focusing in on the clean sheet and how that would boost the back five, he went on to explain.
‘It`s good. They had David Marshall behind them with the captain`s armband on and he has a vast amount of experience. The actual back four was made up of three young lads on loan from Chelsea and Max Clark who has come through our own Academy. It was a very young back four, and actually it was a young team on the whole. We showed that resilience to see a game out and played some bright, sharp, intelligent football where we`ve moved the ball quickly and calmly.’
With Aina’s goal coming from a corner.
‘We have standard set-plays and then you work on different things that you can bring into a game. It takes a bit of time in terms of people knowing what their roles and responsibilities are. We changed personnel around a little bit for this one but it`s something we work on. Andy Crosby (Assistant Head Coach) works very hard on our set-pieces, both for and against, because it is an important part of the game.’
With Jon Toral starting, Adkins said it was just to get some more minutes into his legs following injury.
‘That was to get more minutes in his legs. He had his hamstring injury but now I feel that the more we play him, the better he is going to get. He`s a talented football player. Evandro is another one – we got an hour out of him in this game and that is one we need to keep building, but again you can see what a good, intelligent player he is. We got Fraizer Campbell on the pitch as well and although that was only for 15 minutes, it was a valuable 15 minutes for him and his fitness.’
Adding that he was also pleased to have a few selection dilemma’s now.
‘It`s what we need. We`ve spoken about our injury list – we`ve had something like 17 players out injured over the festive period which is ridiculous. We`ve got some of those coming back but we`ve got at least another cup game to come and 20 league games of which every single one is a cup final and we have to go out there with the endeavour to win every single one. Competition for places helps with that, as does the impact from the bench.’
