In an interview a few years ago Curtis Davies was asked “What was your greatest moment in football?” And he answered “Scoring in the FA Cup final” they then asked him for his lowest moment and he said “Losing the Fa cup final”
The fact these two events were less than two hours apart is quite incredible.
As I stood high in the stands that day clapping the most dogged and utterly brave performance we’d just witnessed from our club the image of a hobbled and beaten Curtis, still acknowledging the crowd filled me with both pride and despair in equal measure. I’m genuinely not sure if I ever saw a more super human effort to win one game by a Hull City player. He’d finished extra time, barely able to walk, thrown up top as City desperately pushed for an equaliser which only 1 in 92 of the clubs in the football league would have begrudged us.
It wasn’t as if Curtis didn’t have form for laying down in traffic to win a game. During a four year stint at the club from 2013-17 and 123 appearances Curtis would lead from the front and set the tone, he was organised, strong, read a game with ease and like all the great ones his last challenge was inevitably his best one.
Curtis himself probably wouldn’t fully understand the depth of compliment by calling him a modern version of Peter Skipper but I’m sure that reading this blog, many of you do. He was a proper defender whose game was based on stopping the opposing team and shutting the door on them with impeccable timing.
The fact he was an integral part of the most successful team we’ve ever had, who won promotion and eased to safety in the Premier League then qualified for Europe was one thing. But he was also the man to step up when you were on your backside metaphorically. Two cases in point, it was Curtis who put up the famous squad photo in 2016 when we had barely a seven a side team of senior pros, but the same group beat the Champions Leicester on the opening day, you only do that with professionals like him and just a few months before this City were cruising at 3-0 up in the first leg of the play off semi finals against Derby County. However it quickly went south in the second leg and we found ourselves 2-0 down at half time. Reportedly it was Curtis and Michael Dawson who took over that half time team talk and made it clear that we wouldn’t concede again.., and 2-0 it stayed.
It’s amazing how quickly football changes in terms of the demands we make of defenders and Marco Silva wanted slicker and more technical defenders, so in that 2016-17 season Curtis was phased out for a back three of Ranocchia, Dawson and Maguire. Far be it from me to nit pick at one of the better managers we’ve seen at the K.Com but for all our swashbuckling that spring we did also have a nasty habit of letting in some soft goals from crosses. Perhaps away from home the big man might have got us a point or two more that we so desperately needed.
After that season Curtis quietly joined Derby where he’d do similarly sterling work. Normally leaving City for a club we don’t exactly love means a few choice words from the fanbase but they didn’t forget… they knew. So when the likes of Curt, Huddz or Rosey returned… they were never really given the treatment.
Obviously last month Curtis called time on a hell of a career, moving to work with Sky in punditry, which led me to this piece. He’s right up there for me with our best ever defenders, he wasn’t quite as marauding as Maguire, or as slick as Jacob Greaves, but I defy anyone to give me a defender that brought more bloody minded determination, professionalism and will to win than Curtis.
I’m sure all City fans would join me in wishing him a happy retirement and would also conclude that Curtis Davies was some larker.
Thanks for reading and happy new season. UTT.