Wolves 1-0 Hull City

Yesterday Wolves defeated Hull City 1-0 to move out of the relegation zone. Kevin Doyle scored in the second half to secure a crucial three points for the Molineux men. 

- Given the dire lack of options in the squad at the moment, despite seemingly every player having been out of form for the past 18 months, Dean Saunders made one change. Tongo Doumbia, in theory one of the best midfielders in the division replacing the suspended Jamie O'Hara in the centre of midfield. But, Saunders made a slight change to the system - I think everyone expected a similar 4-4-2 formation to Saturday's, but got a slight surprise when Stephen Hunt lined up behind Kevin Doyle, with Björn Sigurðarson playing on the right hand side of midfield. I've long advocated trying Hunt in the middle of the pitch, where his high octane energy levels can be used to more effect in disrupting the opposition's play. I also thought it would be interesting to see how Doyle and Hunt played together; they are good friends off the pitch, but have never really translated this to between the white lines. Perhaps with the two of them playing more in tandem upfront, they would be able to play closer together and bring their bromance to the pitch.

- But, this selection had one frustration for me. I've written on here before, and no doubt I will again, but Sigurðarson is not a right sided midfielder. Perhaps he could be used as a right forward in a 4-3-3 style formation, but as the wide-man in a four man midfield? No way. I've written on here before that Doyle has impressed when played out wide, especially given his diminished goal threat over the past two years. I think he has a better footballing brain than Sigurðarson, and is far better defensively. Similarly, no one will question that Sigurðarson is quicker than Doyle, and generally gives a greater attacking threat. Doyle will hold the ball up to greater effect than Sigurðarson, but surely you want the greater goal threat closer to the goal?

- Hull City played an interesting formation, that appeared to be a 5-2-3 formation. The last time we played a team playing three defenders, we scraped a point against Watford, with Jack Robinson and Matt Doherty not making the most of the space that was afforded them. But, with Hull's three man forward line, Robinson and Doherty were closed down early on, meaning that it was our central midfield that had the space, with Hunt often finding pockets of room behind Doyle. Hull's formation was even more interesting when you consider that they're central forward was George Boyd, not your typical striker. Instead, Boyd dropped deeper, but wasn't really able to influence play. And, after 20 minutes, fortunately Robert Koren picked up a knock (he would almost certainly have scored a late equaliser had he stayed on), and was replaced by Jay Simpson. This gave Hull a more rigid focal point through the middle, while giving Boyd even more freedom to come off the front and influence play.

- While Hull had three front men when defending, none of these players provided any width when on the attack. Instead all of Hull's width came from their wingbacks, and in particular Ahmed Elmohamady who had a fascinating battle with Jack Robinson throughout the 90 minutes. At times, it looked like Elmohamady had the edge over Robinson, and put in two or three dangerous crosses, but Robinson never gave up and equally put in a couple of excellent tackles. In the first half, Robinson was generally left to face Elmohamady one on one, but in the second Stephen Ward did a lot more to help protect the young fullback. 

- In the first point, I said that Tongo Doumbia is theoretically one of the best central midfielders in the league. But, at times under Saunders his play has been almost embarassing; shying away from the ball and seemingly having an extreme lack of confidence. But today, he was far more like the Doumbia we need to get out of this mess. When Seyi Olofinjana was a Wolves player (he's currently on loan at Sheffield Wednesday from tonight's opposition), he always seemed to put in his best performances in the games when he made a strong challenge in the opening five minutes. And today, Doumbia made one of those tackles early on, and then made another. And it seemed like his confidence was returning, to the extent that it was his challenge that directly led to the goal; winning the ball in midfield, before finding Sigurðarson who found Doyle who finished crisply, left footed across the goal (I won't mention that the one time Sigurðarson got the ball in a central offensive position he created a goal...). With no O'Hara, probably for the rest of the season, three more performances of this level from Doumbia will go a long way to getting the points necessary to survive.

- In the second half, Hull made an attacking substitution, taking off Abdoulaye Faye for Matty Fryatt. This obviously necessitated a change in formation, with Hull moving to a 4-4-2 formation, with a diamond midfield; George Boyd playing at the tip. While this move obviously was made with an attacking intent, it did a lot to nullify Elmohamady, who had previously been Hull's best attacking threat as a wing back, now playing as a standard fullback. A couple of minutes later, Saunders brought on Kevin Foley for Stephen Ward, pushing Sigurðarson forward into a defensive 4-4-2 formation. This was a slightly surprising move, but was quite shrewd; Hull moved from having three defenders facing one forward, to two centre backs facing two forwards. This will have meant that the fullbacks who had previously marauded forward as wing backs suddenly had one more threat in behind them.

- If this was a game of Football Manager, I would definitely be selecting the "why can't you play like this every week" post match team talk (at which point my players would probably throw a strop as I'm being unfair, but that's another story). Yes, it was a good performance, but one that has been due for a very long time. In fact, I don't even think we played particularly well against a surprisingly lacklustre Hull side (even more surprising considering they could goal difference away from automatic promotion following Watford's slip up at Millwall), but there was a distinct improvement in the amount of effort and character shown today than there has been in recent weeks. And I felt the fans realised this, and the atmosphere in the last 10 minutes was as electric as it's been all season. In fact, as my dad pointed out, it was like a cup-tie; like we were a lower league side beating one of the big boys to the extent that we cheered every time Dorus de Vries held onto the ball. This as much as anything else should be a stark reminder of how far we've fallen as a club, and just how much rebuilding needs to be done. Dean Saunders was aiming for three wins from the last four. The three points are nothing more than the first step - failure to stay up and tonight's result means nothing.