Many chances made but none taken, City play well against a resurgent Oldham but lose to the only goal of the game.

Up on to the Lancashire Moors for an eminently forgettable afternoon’s football. We had more chances to score than Oldham, but over the piece the fingers of one hand would have been quite sufficient to tot up the aggregate of both sides’ attempts on goal. The home side, sent out in typically dogged but well-organised style by Ronnie Moore, got two more points than they hoped for at kick-off and though on this charmless display the locals who have deserted the Latics in their thousands in recent seasons would be well advised to stick to shopping at B & Q of an afternoon if they thirst after some craft and guile, I suppose finesse is first out the door when relegation comes calling. Mr Moore, a proud purveyor of limited football played by limited footballers and a walking indictment of the stagnation of the modern English game outside of the top echelons of the Premiership and West Hull, will keep his club up and few will care.

An ill-tuned tannoy and an away end improved since our last visit, now sporting a roof, seats and shelter from a mild early Spring day, greeted:

Myhill
Joseph Cort Delaney Edge
France Ashbee Junior Ellison
Fagan Barmby

And the early stages are almost exclusively conducted up in the half that Oldham defend. We look slick and neat, aside from the disappointingly off-the-pace Ellison, and win a dose of corners, but there are no serious efforts on goal. And the first alarm for either ‘keeper arrives on 14 when crook Luke Beckett plants a looping twenty-five yard shot only a foot or so wide of Myhill’s right hand post.

On 22 Ashbee wins the ball, feeds Barmby, he strikes a long pass to France whose ball inside allows Fagan to shoot – deflected wide. From the corner Cort heads wide. Then a few minutes later Fagan loses the ball but France regains possession immediately and slides a fine ball through the middle for Fagan to chase. But his first touch is rotten.

Yes, we’re the better side, yes, we’re the stronger side. But the game dribbles tamely up to half-time with a huge imbalance in favour of midfield grind over penalty-box delicacy. Sinew over brain. Oldham are content, but we’ve usually been better than this these last couple of seasons.

Into the second half, and it’s not getting any better. Both sides are disjointed … Edge earns a yellow … Myhill pouches a tame header … “scrappy” is the adjective you need, and you need it to the power of plenty. If either side strings more than two passes together it’s a surprise and any more than three would be luxury beyond the dreams of avarice. There are times when you fear for us next season – foolishly so, of course, because next season is then, and this is now and I don’t suppose our squad will look much like the current one once we get started (at Watford) in August. But take away Elliott and the shape of the team looks ill-defined, while the man himself offers penetration and fizz that transforms a mundane afternoon into a thrilling win. Barmby can’t do it on his own – he’s not had help from the injured Green for a while, and Fagan was only patchy at best at Boundary Park.

We’re beyond half way in the second period, almost up to the 70th minute, before the game’s key moment arrives. Fagan slips past dour left-back Tierney and is blatantly fouled. Yellow card, free-kick down by the by-line, in precisely the spot where Barmby and Delaney conjured up the fourth goal at Bournemouth last week. The task this time is allocated to Barmby and Ellison: Barmby cuts it back, Ellison runs round into position for the shot and sees it blocked. Corner. Cort rises majestically, a head and more above the Oldham defence, and powers a glorious header goalwards. It’s curving, but it’s sliding inside the post. Isn’t it … just about … noooo …. The ball strikes the inside of the post and rebounds back along the line, with ‘keeper Mildenhall beaten but desperately relieved.

It would have won us the game.

Barmby comes off now, and is replaced by Walters.

And then the game’s only goal is scored, but at the wrong end.

Oldham had shown little quality all afternoon, but a free-kick on the left is delivered with pace and power into our box. A flick header, Myhill gets a hand to it – it’s up the far end and I can’t see if the ball flies into our net via the outstretched glove or whether Myhill stops it only to see the loose ball immediately shoved over our line, but either way it’s in and the home side is celebrating as if Roger Palmer’s been named the new Doctor Who and allowed to return regenerated twenty years younger. They don’t deserve it (neither goal not Timelord intervention), but it won’t bother them and we needn’t waste our time with it either.

It released us to play our most positive and focused football of the match. Price comes on for the unimpressive Joseph, and France drops in at right-back. A chance quickly falls to the new man as Walters cleverly sets up Price down the right but his first touch is ordinary and the subsequent shot rolls harmlessly away across the face of the goal and beyond the far post. Ellison – poor throughout – comes off for Wilbraham, and we resort to an audacious but necessary 4-3-3, with Wilbo joining Fagan and Walters up front. No question who is the pick of this trio, or indeed of the rest of the side, as the minutes tick down – Wilbraham. He gets involved, he wins headers, he’s a proper nuisance to the Oldham defence and more performances like this – several more – may lead to Mr Taylor hauling Wilbraham off the scraphead to which his own lettuce-limp efforts earlier this season had condemned him. But for all Wilbraham’s efforts, supported by due urgency from midfield and an increasingly adventurous Leon Cort, we can’t find an equaliser. Wilbraham’s shot on 80 which takes a deflection and spins just wide of the far post in the closest we get.

Enough already. Some games absorb, some game inspire, some games intrigue, some games have you thinking “wish I didn’t have to report on that one”. Easter slips behind us, Tranmere had two chances to close the gap and took neither. Time is running out for them. We can play better than we have this weekend, but probably don’t need to. With Elliott to return, we should get there – a shade cosily.

HULL CITY (4-4-2): Myhill; Joseph, Cort, Delaney, Edge; France, Ashbee, Lewis, Ellison; Fagan, Barmby.  Subs: Walters (for Barmby, 68), Price (for Joseph, 75), Wilbraham (for Ellison, 80), Hessenthaler, Duke.

Goals: None

Booked: Edge

Sent Off: None

OLDHAM ATHLETIC: Mildenhall, Holden, Owen, Stam, Tierney, Betsy, Haining, Kilkenny, Eyres, Beckett, Killen.  Subs: Hughes (for Haining, 23), Bonner, Johnson, Vernon, Pogliacomi.

Goals: Killen 71

Booked: Tierney

Sent Off: None

REFEREE: M Atkinson

ATTENDANCE: 8,562