The Sports Lowdown For All Your News and Opinions
Hull City boss Steve Bruce couldn’t see his side faced with a relegation battle after the summer of transfer activity he had at the start of the season.
Bruce said: “At the end of August when I looked at the squad I didn’t think we would be in this situation.”
Bruce’s side head into the final game of the season two points from safety, and face up against his old club Manchester United, where he made over 300 appearances as a player.
The other side in relegation peril are Newcastle, who’s run of ten games without a victory has seen them plummet down the table.
But Bruce knows that even a win against the Red Devil’s may not be enough, relying on Newcastle to lose. Failure to win on Sunday would see Hull’s six year tenure in the top flight come to an end.
Following the departure of striker Shane Long to Southampton in the summer, Bruce needed to bring in some attacking players to fill the void. He broke the clubs record transfer fee by signing Uruguayan forward Abel Hernandez in a deal reportedly worth £10 million, and added Hatem Ben Arfa, Mohamed Diame and Gastón Ramírez.
But Hernandez hasn’t quite hit the ground running since his arrival to the KC Stadium, and it’s a striker that the club already had that leads the way with the goals.
Nikica Jelavic has been the Tigers top scorer with eight goals, but like many of his teammates over the course of the season, he has spent a lot of time out injured.
