City have kept just three clean sheets in their 17 league games so far
Hull City skipper Lewie Coyle says it’s important his teammates get back to basics in their bid to stem the tide of goals going in the back of their net.
Only bottom side Sheffield Wednesday (33) has shipped more than the 29 the Tigers have in their 17 games so far, and it’s hampering their hopes of maintaining a play-off push.
Since keeping just a third clean sheet of the season at Norwich City, the Tigers have conceded nine goals in four games, leaving them to face up to three defeats in their last four outings.
For 65 minutes on Tuesday night, the Tigers were well organised and disciplined against Ipswich Town, before defensive errors allowed the Tractor Boys to score twice in four minutes to kill the game, and Coyle says the solution is fairly simple.
“Whenever you’re going through a patch where you’re conceding goals, it never is just one unit, if you like,” the City ace told Hull Live. “It’s collective right through the team, and that’s one thing that the boys do take is ownership and accountability.
“It’s never finger-pointing or blaming on one person or one certain moment. There’s always moments in the game that you can look back on and say, ‘It can be stopped at source’.
“It’s a tough one to put your finger on. I think we need to be much more balanced. We’re scoring goals, but we do ultimately need to improve the manner in which we’re conceding goals.
“For me, in terms of getting better at that, I think we need to revisit the basics a little bit more, not overthink it as well. I think you can start to overthink it and really delve into it a little bit too much, and then you start overthinking things when you’re out there on the pitch. Hammering home the basics and revisiting the things that have kept us clean sheets previously.
“I think making good decisions in key moments in games, not overplaying at times, and then on the flip side, being brave at times when it is time to play.
“We’ve got to be better at picking people up in the box, we’ve got to stop more crosses. Just all over the pitch, we’ve got to be tighter and do the ugly side of the game, which ultimately will stop moments coming where they’re getting chances
“That can come from me even more than I already try, like being onto lads in games and stuff. Communication solves a lot of problems on a football pitch, it really does, and I think that’s something we can get slightly better at as well.”
For a time at Loftus Road last weekend, City were third in the table when Enis Destan put them back in front, but after that defeat, coupled with what happened on Tuesday, Sergej Jakirovic’s men are now 11th. Despite dropping out of the top six, the Tigers are just two points outside the play-offs after 17 games, and remain firmly in the hunt.
City have also punished ruthlessly at times, when they’ve made mistakes, but Coyle believes if they can cut them out, they’ll give themselves a stronger chance of getting back on a winning run, starting on Saturday at second-placed Stoke City.
“That just shows the level in the Championship that you can’t afford to have them little moments of lapse in concentration, switching off, but it seems like when we have this season, we have really been punished for it,” he continued. “That’s on us. We can’t expect any favours from any teams that, if we do have lapses of concentration, teams aren’t going to punish us.
“Ultimately, if it were the other way around, we’d be looking to punish teams, so that’s something that we need to work on; it needs to be a constant for 90 plus, however many minutes the game goes on for.
“We’re still in a good spot. There are loads of positives we can take, and that’s the narrative I’m trying to push down there (at the training ground), that there are a lot of positives to take from the recent games; there is stuff we need to touch upon for sure.
“It’s never nice to lose back-to-back games and lose a couple of games. You are going to lose games in this league; it’s how you bounce back. We need to go on a little run again and put that run together, and when we do, we’ll be right back amongst it, where again you’re looking at it (the table), and it looks all healthy all of a sudden.”
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