Bottom-placed Hull FC succumb to latest fate as ugly cycle comes home to roost

2024 will be Hull FC's worst season in the Super League era.
-Credit: (Image: SW Pix)


And there you have it: Hull FC are bottom of Super League, rooted to 12th place in the table after the latest abject showing, a 58-4 home defeat to Salford Red Devils. Moving below London Broncos on points difference, with just one point separating the two sides, the Black and Whites enter the final round of the season with a worst-ever reality dawning on them. It could be their first bottom finish in sixty years and just their second in their entire history.

And with just three wins to their name all season, it’s set to be their worst ever Super League campaign regardless of what happens against Catalans Dragons next week. That’s the situation, as grim as it gets, with apathy strong following another huge defeat in front of a sparse MKM Stadium crowd.

This has been the toughest of seasons, even worse than 1999, and one set to equal 1963-64. It’s been a massive failure, but one where the outcomes are hardly a surprise. You get what you deserve. And there’s no beating around the bush; Hull’s recruitment, retention, and general rugby decisions have been shocking for years and years, leading them to this fate. In fact, each season post-Covid has gotten worse and worse, with Hull finishing 8th, 9th, 10th, and now potentially bottom, with said poor decisions leading them to this fate.

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Those decisions have all come home to roost this year, and once the squad started to get ripped up, the reality is not enough players have come back the other way. Hull have let nine go this year, and despite trying various avenues, only three have come permanently amid the loans, one of which saw Ben Reynolds leave, a big blow to the side, and another, King Vuniyayawa, out for the season with an ankle injury.

Instead, it’s been left to a group of young talent to finish the year—talent that has been overexposed at times, but talent that has, regardless of the situation, continued to give it their best shot. The likes of Will Gardiner, Harvey Barron, Lewis Martin, Logan Moy, Jack Charles, Zach Jebson, Davy Litten, and Denive Balmforth all featured against Salford. The majority have featured for a good proportion of the season. They’ve shown some form and some encouragement, particularly the two wingers and Moy, but to ask them to be the cornerstone of a struggling side, one that is ragtag and filled by loans that are in and out with no continuity and the like, is a big thing.

As said, they deserve credit for not letting it faze them, fronting up and getting on with the situation. The blame doesn’t lie with them. The pointing lies elsewhere, with a lack of senior accountability within the squad and the club again getting to this stage through rugby decisions that over a five-year period just haven’t been good enough. There is acceptance of that from chairman Adam Pearson down through the club. That’s why Richie Myler has been brought in with external club investment in the works.

Of course, there is also context to the season. Hull have been dealt a nightmare blow all year. With the highest squad availability, it was always a challenge, but with the constant chop and change to injuries, knocks, tears, and the like, it’s been impossible. Hull have failed to get a settled side out week to week, and it shows. Once again on Saturday, they lost three players during the game, following a similar theme from recent fixtures. That, if the chances were slim already, has completely written them off. It’s been a similar story all year.

But that context is also their own making. Yusuf Aydin has come to the club from Hull KR and is clearly the fittest player here. That shows Hull have ground to make up on their rivals, and that’s why the voices have centred on a huge pre-season. Hull have a lot of hard work ahead to give themselves the best chance of competing before the big kick off next year.

There’s also the shocking discipline seen throughout the season, which has contributed to the worst card and ban totals in Super League. Contest is context, but it only goes so far. Contest doesn’t excuse defeats like Saturday, not when a resilient performance was put in at Wigan just a month ago. Since then, Hull have conceded 39 to Castleford, 68 at Leeds, and 58 to Salford—a total of 165 points in three games. There’s no context that excuses that.

The manner of defeat is disturbing, to say the least. At the risk of rinse and repeat, Hull’s performances have been abject. There’s no leadership, cohesion, intensity, urgency, energy, desperation, and the like. Instead, it’s a sequence of rudderless and soulless displays that lack direction and shape and instead have seen the side roll over and capitulate. A common theme regardless of personnel in recent seasons, with performances missing the necessary desire and want to compete in games.

That's not acceptable, and it’s an insult to the fans. There’s no pride to the club and each other, but none to the people that pay their wages. That has to change. That’s the number one thing for the new wave to install next year: to have effort, grit, and determination and base everything off hard work and nothing less.

The result can be accepted no matter what when you see those things. When you get the dross that was served up on Saturday, last Friday, and the Saturday before that, the boos and the criticism are more than justified. Losing by 54 points at home is disgusting, especially when it’s the third time it’s happened this year, with Leigh and Huddersfield also achieving the feat. Added to 50+ defeats on the road at Huddersfield, St Helens, and Leeds, and it shows where Hull are.

All in all, they have just three wins to their name all season. They have conceded a whopping 870 points—920, including the Challenge Cup tie. It’s a shocking sequence of events and confirms Hull to their lowest ebb of the summer era: bottom of the league with one round to go. They've well and truly hit rock bottom.

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