Preston 0 Hull City 0: A dull draw at Deepdale

Hull City arrived at Deepdale looking to build on an unexpectedly thrilling start to the new Championship season last Saturday. But for all last week’s euphoria, the challenge of a solid, but limited, Preston side provided a grounding in reality for The Tigers who still have plenty of work to do in shaping and bringing together a top-half squad.

Tyler Smith’s absence created an opportunity for someone up front and Shota Arveladze chose to start Benjamin Tetteh up front rather than move Allahyar Sayyadmanesh from left-wing back. It never really worked, with Tetteh and Oscar Estupiñán looking completely incompatible – though it was Tetteh who offered by far the most of the pair.

City: Ingram, Coyle, Jones, Figueiredo, Greaves, Sayyadmanesh, Seri (Williams), Slater, Tufan (Cannon), Estupiñán (Elder), Tetteh (Covil).

The blow-for-blow account of each half won’t take long. It was a game of few real chances. The official stats say Preston had 20 shots, 6 on target, which doesn’t really tell a story. Hull City’s 1 shot on target definitely does though. The home side started brightly and Matt Ingram pulled off a tremendous early save low to his left from Riis. When they got the ball wide through Potts on the right and the still fantastic Robbie Brady on the left, Preston looked dangerous and their inswinging balls into the box caused some concern but City soon began to assert themselves and found that pressure on the midfield led to the hosts turning over possession time and again to the angst of the sun-drenched North End fans.

City defended in front of a very good following of about 1600 noisy Tigers and the threat at our end became scarcer as the half progressed. Preston couldn’t pass the ball through midfield and our defensive line was able to stay high and force mistakes. Much of that was in vain because our use of the ball we’d won was pretty poor. Attempts to hit the front two bore little fruit. Estupiñán particularly struggled. Playing mostly with his back to goal, he was unable to get hold of the ball on the floor and didn’t win headers. When he had chances to link play, his touch was poor and he had hardly any crosses to attack – which seems to be his game – so he cut a frustrated figure. Tetteh was a bit better. He put some work in, ran the channels and had a few nice moments. He put a good cross in from our left that Jacob Greaves steamed on to but a defender just beat him to it and he slid a great pass inside for Ozan Tufan who found Estupiñán for a shot over the bar from a tight angle.

Tufan was easily the pick of the midfield with Regan Slater hardly involved and Jean Michael Seri having a bit of a nightmare. Preston put Johnson on Seri and he harassed him whenever he got the ball. Johnson has always been a threat against City and they pretty much cancelled each other out so it wasn’t all negative but Seri’s errors all lead to dangerous counter attacks. The first big one saw Jacob Greaves fly in with a superb tackle in midfield but the ball only rebounded back to Whiteman so Slater took a yellow card for the team. Allahyar was also booked for a slightly enthusiastic challenge. He committed about 87 fouls last week so probably can’t complain even though he was booked for his first, perhaps only, foul here.

Where we did complain was the lack of yellow cards given the other way, as Tufan was cynically pulled back on the left after brilliantly tricking his way down the wing, and Hughes took to rugby tackling Tetteh on the right wing having been turned and shown a clean pair of heels by the big man. Who doesn’t love a wildly inconsistent referee, eh?

Half time: Preston North End 0 Hull City 0

That first half was competitive, if a bit dull. City had a very decent spell through the middle of the half with Tufan pulling some strings, Greaves starting to get forward and Allahyar offering an outlet on the left. After the break, it was a different story. Preston came out strong, clearly receiving a bollocking from Ryan Lowe, and City wobbled like we saw in some of those pre-season friendlies. Brady smashed the post with a hugely deflected effort, and we were lucky the rebound evaded everyone, Ingram made a strong stop from a cross/shot at his near post and then saved superbly down to his left again with momentum building. In between, Slater had our only shot on target with a good strike that was straight at the keeper. 

But Arveladze had seen enough and hooked the front two, who hadn’t had a kick since the break, putting Elder on at left wing-back and allowing Allahyar to go through the middle, where he should be starting. The other change saw Vaughn Covil come on again. For those not familiar, Covil is a 19 year-old forward who was born in the US and came through the youth system at Southampton. He was signed for the U21s in the summer from Forest Green where he’d made a couple of appearances. He impressed on the pre-season trips but the fact he’s the first sub on in Championship games is indicitive of where the squad is at the moment. It’s also a damning verdict what Arveladze thinks of Mallik Wilks, who remained an unused sub.

The changes worked initially with young Covil setting the tone putting on pressure and flying into a solid challenge in the corner and some initiative swung back City’s way. A fantastic move off a switch in play by Lewie Coyle saw Elder link with Tufan and Allahyar on the left but his cut back found no-one. Coyle then provided a tempting ball in from the right but it was just too far ahead of Allahyar. The momentum was short-lived, however, as Brady continued to pull some strings. He put in a great cross that was headed down for a shot into the side netting before Riis smashed over after they broke on another Seri error. When that happened again, with the chance going begging, Randell Williams replaced Seri who looked heavy legs and will have to file this under “not my day”.

Arveladze’s subs were all decisive and all with the purpose of ensuring we got a point. Despite most of the last 15-20 minutes being played in our half, we remained solid and we never in too much danger. That was all down the back five who were always solid. Greaves, particularly, was magnificent with his blocks, impeccable tackles, reading of situations and winning of headers. Tobias Figueiredo was very good too – this was his sort of game and he was easily up for the challenge, happy to head everything and help marshall the unit. Jones had a couple of iffy moments and struggled to get on the same page with Coyle at times but both made crucial challenges throughout. Coyle has had a great start to the season. What a tremendous choice he is to captain this side.

The last sub was Andy Cannon replacing the tiring Tufan. Tufan has to have surprised everyone. As soon as the real stuff started last week, a switch flicked and he’s been a different player. He’s nowhere near fit but he’s still putting some graft in and some of his passes and touches are very high-class. The reality of the situation though, comes from the quality and suitability of the subs being put on for the tiring first XI. Cannon has good memories of this fixture last season but it’s about the only memory of him in a City shirt. He finished the season on loan in the National League. Covil is an academy signing who has been pushed to the forefront. Randell Williams shows some promise but has still been in and out throughout his time here. So that left Elder as the only sub available who has pedigree with City in this division.

Full time: Preston North End 0 Hull City 0

There are no bad points away from home in the Championship. You’d generally take one anywhere and we probably need to get used to some stodgy away performances to try and secure one with Shota’s 5-4-1 coming into use quite often.

The worry for the manager at this stage will be the continued task of finding the best and most cohesive starting XI and the quality of players he has to call on from the bench. All of the subs here were negative changes. I’m not sure we had any plans to risk our point to try and win the game in the last 20 minutes but nor did the manager have the players sat behind him to make those positive changes. Perhaps Wilks, if you’re feeling generous? There is mitigation, we were missing Greg Docherty and Smith from last week and Ryan Longman, Nathan Baxter, Brandon Fleming and Doğukan Sinik haven’t been involved yet.

There are players to come back and players to come in. It’s unlikely that we’ll see this squad or some of the players in this position again. For one sunny afternoon in Preston though, it was a stark reminder of the size of the task at hand.