 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|||
|
|||
|
|||
Delusion of a Gamer Hull City are currently without any points after 3 games in the new Championship season. As usual they seem to suffer from an inability to a) score and b) not concede goals; I conclude that there may be a flaw in this strategy. It wasn't always like this of course, back in the mid/late nineties a new Manager came to the club, unknown in professional circles he would pick the club by the scruff of the neck and make them one of Europe's most feared outfits. His name was Mark Elliott, in this exclusive Interview WotR asks him about his time there; WotR: You were an unknown in football circles, how did you get the job? ME: Well, what I did was wander into the local town centre and bought this box with a CD in it. I installed it on my PC and when I ran it I was asked to start my own Management career and to pick a Team. Being for just outside Hull I figured that'd make some sense. I was immediately told I had the job and 250k to spend on new players. WotR: The club had just been relegated and was now in the bottom division of the football league, did you think you could turn it around? ME: I knew I had some skill in using a joypad and thought that two things were important for winning games. Speed was the first, so I loaded the 1st Team with players who were fast, I didn't worry too much about their ability, I hoped that under my control they'd adapt. The second important thing was Goals; you can't win games without scoring. So using the rather good player search utility I was able to find a player who was a) Fast, b) Had a Power Shoot and c) Had an Accurate Shot. John Eyre cost me that entire 250k budget but you can't argue with a 78 goal season.
WotR: After 3 seasons in charge you'd taken Hull into the Premiership winning 2 League Titles on the way and having a coupe of very impressive Cup Runs. Were you surprised how quickly you managed to transform the clubs fortunes? ME: To be honest I didn't expect to get that good that quickly. I think the shortness of the games meant you could rattle off half a season in a single sitting, and also living alone I could get up in the middle of night if I could sleep and play a few games. Once you get into that zone the wins can come thick and fast. Obviously winning the lower leagues meant more money, better crowds and thus better players. I was able to buy quality in very position and back then of course there were no Transfer windows so if an injury came up you could easily plug the gap with a new player. It's much tougher today that's for sure. WotR: You won the Premiership title at your first try beating Chelsea on Goal Difference, were you lucky or did you always believe once you got there you could dominate? ME: It's funny, but I'd forgotten just how close it ended up being, I guess once you've won it you forget how you got there. To be fair I should have wrapped the title up 3 or 4 games before the end, we rather stuttered those last few weeks, losing to Leeds 1 - 0 and drawing 0 - 0 with Man City to let Chelsea back in it. The win against Watford on the last day of the season was a nail-biter. 2 - 0 at half-time I just told myself I could turn it round. No one would have expected Chris Kiwomya to net a Hat trick and seal it. Amazing how much you can get out of a player when you really need it. WotR: I guess if were going to talk about comebacks the next point of reference has to be that amazing game in Madrid a year later when you were seemingly going to lose that Champions League Semi Final again Real, only to somehow turn it around. Can you tell you about that? ME: Well I really didn't know how I managed that. After 1 - 1 draw at home I thought we'd maybe lost our chance, Real were a tough team and that away goal of theirs didn't sit well with me or the players. Of course it got much worse when we conceded 3 in the first half and we're sitting in my living room watching some MTV to calm down thinking should I just reload the game and start again. I didn't though and after a stiff cup of tea and figured I'd nothing to lose in the 2nd half.
WotR: Your living room? ME: Yeah that's were the PC was, you know that I played the game on. WotR: Erm? ME: So anyway, 2nd half start and we get a goal back. There's 30mins left to get another couple and we'd win on Away goals. Then for 25mins I can't play, nothing works, they hit the post and the crossbar from 2 consecutive corners and well I'm wondering which wall to throw the joypad at. With 87mins on the clock I get a break coming in from the left touch line, into their half a deft one two and Mark Viduka I think it is unleashes a shot from 25yards out, it flies into the right hand top corner. 2 - 3. 89th minute and the bugger only goes and scores almost exactly the same goal, it's 3 - 3 and we're through. Just to add insult to injury we get another to win the game 4 - 3, truly unbelievable. I was jumping up and down and screaming. Unreal times. WotR: The Final was a bit of an anti-climax really then? ME: Yeah that Real game should have been the final really, I was very happy to beat Ajax 1 - 0 but it wasn't quite the same. Still Hull City were the best in Europe and that was quite an achievement. WotR: You left Hull a Season later after doing the Quadruple (Premiership, FA Cup, League Cup, Champions League). I supposed you'd taken the job as far as you could? ME: Pretty much, the only think I never managed with Hull was an unbeaten season, we kept letting in silly goals, or getting key men injured at the wrong times, I guess that's Football for you, never a dull moment. Of course leaving Hull for Barcelona meant I finally saw that dream come true, great days.
WotR: Then you left as fast as you'd arrived. Why was that? ME: New Technology I'm afraid, the game just wasn't the same once the new boys turned up. I couldn't get the thing to run anymore, I lost heart and drifted into other sports instead. WotR: Well thanks for your time, it really was a golden age.
September 2006
|
