As the famous John Lydgate quote that is often attributed to Abraham Lincoln goes…
“You can please some of the people all of the time and you can please all of the people some of the time, but you can’t please all of the people all of the time.”
Well… so it came to pass this week for this City blogger as I incurred the wrath of City X, with lots of Callum underscore lots of numbers and Craig hashtag HCAFC couple of flags coming for me. The reason why? Well, not that it’s terribly important but I was a bit puzzled by the metaphorical tartan bunting some parts of our fanbase were laying out, and desperately wishing for our half fit striker to be elevated to play for the Auld Enemy (C) in next summer’s world cup. I mean, whatever floats your boat, but I support City and occasionally I’m tortured by England, I just can’t gather the energy to be buzzed up by other countries, even if City players might play for them.
Anywho… somebody called me the “Dislikes of Hull” and a geezer that does pub music around told me it was the “dumbest thing on the internet today”, quite the complement really, considering what he ranked above my post. I guess the bad news for my detractors was at least 44 people broadly agreed with me, and I figure this is just a 2025 thing, some people like what you say, some people don’t and some want a plaque of locusts to descend on you and your known relatives for the foreseeable future. It’s just the way of the world these days I’m afraid…
In my slight defense I try to do for City what the national medias have given up, see both sides, not necessarily get too positive or negative about owners, managers, players, eras etc. There’s a real lack of balance to outputs these days, in and out of the city stratosphere. Sure, what I said was meant as a bit dry and darkly humorous, but at the same time it was just what I thought. None of us are getting out of this life alive and perhaps it’s all a little too serious on socials these days. Ho hum.
So with my new darker, less positive persona revealed, I thought I’d have a go at redemption. Write something on the current product that was positive (please note, it was just two blogs ago I did exactly that with a blog about the aforementioned “Scottish” striker) but here we are.
Waaaaay back in one of my earlier blogs in June I said of our manager…
“I can’t be the only person impressed by Sergej Jakirovic. The way he conducts himself, his calmness, the professional manner in which he displays. His experience is wide, he’s a winner and you get the impression he’s the calmest man in the room”
He’s proved that so far and then some. He’s positive without being deluded, he’s liked by the players without being taken for granted, he’s savvy and his in game decisions have got more and more impressive over the opening months to the season. Game after game (Swansea away, Norwich away, Preston home) if things don’t start the way he wants, he doesn’t panic, but he begins to put them right. That to me is where a manager really earns his money and it’s where some (and some that are very well liked historically at City) came up short on occasions.
Then there’s the other ace up his sleeve. Lots of managers are great with THEIR players, the ones they bring in, the ones they’ve worked with before, that’s pretty standard. But the really good ones get a tune out of players that were already here. Look at what Phil Brown did for Michael Turner, what Brian Horton did for Billy Whitehurst, what Marco Silva did for Harry Maguire or Sam Clucas.
So who is Sergej’s successes? Several you could argue, this is far and away the best we’ve seen from Ryan Giles for starters, yes perhaps that’s an easy one but there’s others. I think John Egan has gone up a gear, Kyle Joseph looks like a player reborn and speaking of negative fanbases, Regan Slater has pulled down their pants for the umpteenth time, because he’s been a crucial part of what’s gone right. There are others too, and it’s interesting to see when Sergej has taken players out of the limelight for a while, in my view protecting them, then easing them back at the right time, that’s a good manager ladies and gentlemen. That’s really not easy.
Everyone can’t succeed though, and we’ve loaned out or moved on players too, and will again in January. Kasey Palmer will be fancied to be out the door at some point but I can see nothing to suggest that the big Bosnian hasn’t given him every chance to succeed. You could also argue that Mason Burstow is now an asset to the club to be used at some point for either money or to bring back, and again that was a decision that time has shown to be wise, even if the timing was in a vacuum a little worrying.
His calmness is shown in the performances and he has an aura. Where can we go with this? I think we’re all at that junction philosophically? Play offs, really would be insanely good, considering the restrictions on the club and where we came from last year. It would vindicate the ownership and be frankly an amazing story. But in reality, if we don’t quite make it, top ten or thereabouts, I still think it represents big big strides forward, and the big man is a huge factor in the improved results, style and success we’ve seen.
We’ll see I guess, someone has already popped up on Twitter to take down my pro-Sergej take, telling me it’s not Christmas yet. Maybe if I’m getting stick for being too positive and too negative now I’ve got something right. What I do know is that the Christmas period is going to be fun, watching this team is enjoyable again and Sergej and his coaching team as well as the ownership for bringing him in deserve the plaudits. Somebody told me this week I should be pleased for Oli McB, if he makes his dream of playing in the World Cup, well I’ll match that up it a little by saying that if Sergej dreams of managing Bosnia and Herzegovina in the World Cup, I hope it doesn’t happen, because I hope he’s at Hull City, soz and that, but that’s who I love first, second and third and that’s never going to change.
Thanks for reading.
UTT. “The dislikes of Hull”