High flying Reading visit the KC and dominate utterly at times, but also receive a severe chasing for a while.  In the end a one all draw is about right.

A hard-fought point against opposition of genuine quality. The Biscuitmen (to give them their correct nickname: none of this Royals baloney), funded to the tune of some forty million it is said by the enigmatic John Madautoexpressski, suitor (allegedly) of that Liverpool docker’s daughter turned Beatles groupie Cilla Black, came to the Circle in their Hallmark coach (always a sign of class, that) with the meanest defence in the Division, a defence which had only been breached once on its travels, and, after a shaky start by the Tigers, were forced to fight all the way for a point in a nail-biting contest which swung one way to the other throughout and kept the 17 698 crowd thoroughly absorbed.

From our point of view, it definitely looked as though another step had been taken along the Division 2 learning curve. Granted, we made the mistake yet again of showing a side with a big reputation too much respect from the off, to the point where it looked to your correspondent as though we were in for a Wolves-style roasting from the Jammiedodgermen. But I’ve been wrong before, and, prompted no doubt by some highly-theatrical Taylor rantings from the touchline, we snapped out of our deferential frame of mind, started to show a lorra lorra bottle, and throughout the rest of the game countered the Garibaldimen’s evident flair and skill with large measures of good honest endeavour, and by doing the simple things well, which has always been one of our great strengths. If we can lay this down as the benchmark, starting hopefully in what is an eminently-winnable game against Dorrbeh on Saturday, something tells me we’re going to be alright.

Big surprises in the City line-up: no place in the starting line-up for Barmby (who in the light of recent showings can’t have too many complaints about that) or for the mercurial Ulsterman, and a blind date with the left back spot for Lynch. And Green - what’s all that about, Alfie, especially when Joseph at RB and keeping France where he normally goes would be the obvious step? So we were thus:

Myhill
France Cort Delaney Lynch
Green Woodhouse Welsh Ellison
Fagan Brown

Subs: Elliott (For Green, 76 mins), Burgess (for Fagan, 79 mins)

City kicked off towards the 350 or so Reading fans, and in the early stages did little to inspire any confidence that they would disturb the onion bag at the North Stand for the first time this season. Au contraire, for the Batholivermen swept more or less immediately down to the other end and stayed there for the best part of twenty minutes, although their task was made easier, it had to be said, by City bringing everyone back to defend the Custardcreammen’s procession of corners, which allowed them to ping the ball with the minimum of ceremony straight back into the danger zone, and being generally profligate with the leather when we did get a kick at it. Despite all of this, Boaz was severely tested only once in this entire spell, when the Lemonpuffmen’s 15 beat Delaney to a ball which should have been the ruddy-cheeked Irishman’s all the way, and forced a full-stretch save from our netminder.

And then, on 18 minutes, by which time the crowd was just starting to lose that loving feeling, we got going. The catalyst for this seemed to be the failure of Green (who although getting a bit more involved last night was still well short of being up to scratch) to challenge for a ball in front of the East Stand. The roar of frustration from the crowd at this finally seemed to galvanise the Tigers into action, and, as instantly as if someone had flicked a switch, we started to play with real spirit and, dare I say it, boss the midfield. Of course, the clearly-angry gesticulations of the manager may have had something to do with it as well. But whatever the cause, we suddenly had the Gingernut men on the run. A sweeping seven-man move ended with Welsh (for my money our star performer last night in terms of both effort and skill) having a header from a France cross saved, and then Ellison (who built on Saturday’s solid showing, but why do his steps get shorter the more excited he becomes?) was harshly adjudged offside as he got onto the end of another France ball, but he then came close to repeating his success of Saturday on 26 as he joined a move involving Brown, France and Green but, from a narrow angle and under pressure from the Richteamen’s keeper and couple of defenders, could only find the side netting. We even won our first corner on 29 (bringing the count down to 1 – 6 or thereabouts) and from our second Brown ought to have done better than direct his free header over the bar.

This had been a good spell of pressure, but the Hobnobmen weathered it and finished the half the stronger, with Myhill making a superb save from a bullet-like header, followed by a near-post stop close to half-time after Lynch had been nutmegged by his opponent. Brown then put another header over, this time from an Ellison cross, before the half was rounded off by Boaz saving another header, this time from a corner, and the players trooped off to deservedly-generous applause.

The second half threatened to drift into formless mode when the Digestivemen suddenly attacked on 50 minutes, and Lita, who it has to be said was solidly policed by the Tigers throughout and was eventually subbed, managed to put a header across the face of the goal from point-blank range after we had given them too much space on their left flank to get the cross in.

But then, on 56, we scored, oh yes. It started when Cort rose majestically to head a left wing corner against the bar. A Marylandcookieman lunged at the rebound and sent it back to the flank, where Woodhouse picked up the leather, stepped inside, love, and drilled in a hard low cross which – surprise, surprise – Brown popped up to tuck inside the near post from six yards. 1 – 0. To us. The Circle was in raptures, but can we please all make a stand against that ruddy “Easy, Easy” chant? It was devised by “footy” fans for “footy” fans, for no purpose other than to give them another irrelevant reason to go to games (along with painting their faces and constantly getting up for refreshment and toilet visits during the game, to name but two), and if you engage in it you aren’t a true football fan. Please try to remember that.

It was nearly two as well, four minutes later, as Penguinmen’s keeper Hahnemann made a complete hash of a clearance, leaving Fagan with an open goal some 35 yards from the goal line and wide out – in fact, virtually the same position as that from which Bobby Davison nonchalantly floated the ball into the net against Burnley nearly ten years ago - but sadly young Craig got a little over excited and sliced the ball wide of the unguarded goal, although Greeny almost got a touch as he followed up.

The Nicemen were clearly reeling at this point, but luckily for them the momentum went out of the game due to a series of stoppages, including one which saw referee Laws have to leave the field due to an injury (shame it wasn’t his brother, the cheating bastard), and when the game got back into its swing they seized the initiative back and were soon on level terms. Concentration was lacking as France firstly effected a fresh-air shot when attempting to clear, and then hit it straight back to one of theirs when he got another go. The ball was duly swung into the box where the impressive Little, perhaps with the benefit of slackish marking, rose to plant a firm header to the right of the blameless Boaz.

Would we now surround ourselves with sorrow? Not this time. The two substitutions brought some life into tired legs, and whilst the final quarter of an hour saw the game played at its most sedate pace of the evening, and we had our scary moments, so did the Gipsycreammen. As the clock swung round to 90 minutes another header flashed across the City goal, but in the four minutes of stoppage time which remained we could have scored twice. Brown and Fagan combined but could just not get the ball onto the boot of the unmarked Elliott, and then Big Ben hit a viciously dipping 25-yarder from a Brown knock-down which went only just over.

Anyone who had a heart would have been well pleased with our efforts last night. We are, slowly but surely, getting the measure of this League, as becomes more apparent with almost every game, and if this continues, and at the same time we can strengthen the playing staff through an improvement in the injury situation and maybe some astute brandishing of the cheque book come the transfer window, whilst we won’t win any silverware this term we ought in the second half of the season to be able to have some fun, hopefully at the expense of more-fancied outfits. And I think we’d settle for that this time round, wouldn’t we?

HULL CITY (4-4-2): Myhill; France, Cort, Delaney, Lynch; Green, Welsh, Woodhouse, Ellison; Brown, Fagan.  Subs: Elliott (for Green, 76), Burgess (for Fagan, 79), Barmby, Joseph, Duke.

Goals: Brown 56

Booked: Woodhouse

Sent Off: None

READING: Hahnemann, Makin, Sonko, Ingimarsson, Shorey, Little, Gunnarsson, Harper, Convey, Lita, Doyle.  Subs: Oster (for Convey, 70), Kitson (for Lita, 70), Sidwell, Hunt, Stack.

Goals: Little 74

Booked: None

Sent Off: None

REFEREE: G Laws

ATTENDANCE: 17,698