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Words: Luke Flanagan (@LukeOT92)

After the euphoric final day survival at Portsmouth, what needs to happen at the MKM to ensure next season doesn’t go the same way?

Ask any Hull City fan about 2024/25 and they will probably just want to forget the full campaign and not want to relive many parts of it.

There were high points. Most of these were away days when City got results no-one expected them to. Sheffield United away in January springs to mind here, with a 3-0 victory sending a sold out away end into raptures.

Sheffield Wednesday away, too – an awful game, but one where the entire Tigers faithful got behind the team and managed to get a 94th minute winner (and a game that potentially kept us up). However, these were few and far between.

The real problem for City is that after almost getting into the playoffs in 2023/24, Chairman Acun Illicali took his eye off the ball when it came to manager and player recruitment. He dismissed Liam Rosenior, replacing him with the charlatan that was Tim Walter.

The German was tactically naive, poor at motivating his players but also unwilling to try to forge a relationship with the fans. The atmosphere towards him after the home draw with Portsmouth and also the away loss to Oxford United was toxic and Illicali was left with no other option than to dismiss him before Christmas.

Having said that, however inept Walter was, he was not given support in the transfer window with getting players in early due to Illicali’s pre-occupation on the board at his Turkish club Fenerbahce. This meant Walter never really stood a chance, and it was left to Ruben Selles to drag City to survival on the final day after being bottom of the league under Walter.

Illicali must learn his lesson.

It looks like Sergej Jakirovic will be the new City Coach in the coming weeks, as the club have applied for a work visa for Kayserispor coach. If this is the case, Illicali has already said no player signings will take place until the Head Coach is in place. This needs to be done as soon as possible, as the more time this takes the more fans will get restless and worried about a repeat of last summer.

City have some very good players they can build a strong team around. They had an excellent defence under Selles, but they didn’t score enough goals. The big name striker promised by Illicali last summer never materialised, and if players like Liam Millar, Mo Belloumi and Eliot Matazo are fit for the start of the season and are committed to the club there is a good chance there will be a huge improvement on the pitch for the new campaign.

One thing that is needed though is a player who will score goals on a regular basis – something City have struggled with over the past few seasons.

I hate this time of season as random names get banded about and self proclaimed experts start posting their lists of who to sign on X or BlueSky. There’s little or no certainty about anything until players actually sign, and it breeds resentment amongst fanbases.

Fans must be patient with these appointments, but Illicali must ensure he learns from his mistakes of last season. It can’t happen again, or the club will not get so lucky escaping relegation a second time.