‘Billy Sharp will do fine, but City need to make some changes’
‘FREE, HARD AND VASTLY EXPERIENCED’: Billy Sharp. Pictures courtesy of Hull City
Where the Tigers need to strengthen this transfer window
By Sam Hawcroft, Hull City Correspondent
SO, it’s January – and we all know what that means: the January sales. Or, as they are known in the world of football, the transfer window.
City didn’t exactly have the happiest of Christmases, being edged out at Bristol City the Friday before and going down 0-1 at Sunderland on Boxing Day.
They ensured that they ended 2023 on a high note by beating Blackburn in a five-goal thriller on December 29, but had a nightmare evening at Sheffield Wednesday on New Year’s Day.
Although this pushed the Tigers back down to seventh after finishing 2023 in sixth, this is still an incredible turnaround in just a year, because at the end of 2022 we were languishing 21st in the league.
I wrote previously in The Hull Story that the team isn’t the finished article, and that’s been plain to see in recent weeks.
City remain inconsistent – in December, they lurched from the despair of back-to-back defeats to the joy of successive wins, before losing two on the trot again – but the fact we are still very much in contention for the top six demonstrates how tight it is among the chasing pack. As I write this, only five points separate sixth and 14th place.
GOOD SIGNING: Scott Twine
Up until the Sunderland match, Liam Rosenior hadn’t made much noise around the urgent need for replacements, instead regularly lavishing praise on the unity of his young squad – but after yet another performance in which they were punished for failing to take earlier chances, he conceded that this was something he needed to address in January.
While they’ve proved they’re not a one-man team, the absence of Jaden Philogene has nevertheless been a major blow, and injury has also cast a doubt over the fitness of Ryan Allsop, leading some to suggest a 'keeper may be on Rosenior’s shopping list.
Allsop has been both hero and villain in recent matches, but then that’s the nature of being a 'keeper – you’re only as good as your last match.
Errors made between the sticks are always amplified tenfold and lead to knee-jerk reactions on social media from people who seem to think the perfect infallible goalkeeper, a) exists and b) would be beating a path to the door of a Championship club.
In the longer-term, in an ideal world City should be seeking permanent deals for Tyler Morton and Liam Delap, both of whom have been superb additions to the first team.
One wonders where we’d be in the table without their influence, and Delap in particular is just getting better and better. As others have said, we really need to be approaching Manchester City with a blank chequebook at the end of the season.
If we don’t manage to sign them, though, the way they’ve been nurtured in their short time in Hull should surely put us firmly on the radar of more Premier League sides who will be encouraged by our setup and loan us more of their starlets.
The prospect of keeping Scott Twine is more divisive – though I’m siding with the “yes” camp. He’s a likeable character, for a start, and, while it took a fair time for him to live up to his “dead ball specialist” billing with that fantastic strike against Cardiff, for me it’s his work off the ball that’s just as important.
Back to the January window, and two or three more players at the most are likely to join the club this month, suggesting Tigers owner Acun Ilicali has learned his lesson from the Shota Arveladze days when he splashed the cash on anything and everything like a bloke in Pandora on Christmas Eve.
He is not, as we know, a passive owner, though – he will certainly have an input into who else comes on board this month.
So who should City ship out? It pains me to say it, but Cyrus Christie hasn’t lived up to his early promise, and neither has Allahyar Sayyadmanesh, although it’s arguable that the latter hasn’t been given a great deal of a chance to show what he can do.
TIME TO GO?: Dogukan Sinik
Dogukan Sinik? Definitely get rid. I’ve a lot of time for Greg Docherty but he is, sadly, a bit-part player these days, too. However, based on his goal-making cameo at Middlesbrough alone, perhaps Ruben Vinagre is worth hanging on to if he can return to fitness.
As always happens at this time of year, the rumour mill goes into overdrive with all sorts of names thrown into the mix on social media. Likely targets include Swansea forward Liam Cullen and Derby midfielder Max Bird, but high on the list also needs to be a left-back and possibly a winger.
Someone who has already joined the club is Billy Sharp, the 37-year-old ex-Sheffield United legend, on a free transfer until the end of this season.
His addition seems to have divided the generations a bit; while younger ones fail to see the point, the thinking of older fans (of which I’m reluctantly coming to accept I’m one) is along the lines of – he was free, he’s hard, and he’s vastly experienced, and the squad is lacking in these latter two qualities.
Sharp might be getting on a bit, but to say he knows where the goal is an understatement, with him being the Championship’s all-time top scorer (with 130 goals and nearly 400 league appearances), and he might be a key late substitute to change games. Rosenior called his signing “the ultimate no-brainer” – and I can’t disagree. What’s not to like?
There is one negative aspect, though. After someone on Twitter cautioned against fans chanting his name to the tune of Baby Shark, this has been going around my head ever since.
And now it’s doing the same in yours. Sorry…