Hull City goal hero issues stern warning to Sunderland as the Tigers target safety
City will be aiming to cause another Championship upset at at the Stadium of Light this weekend
Hull City star Matt Crooks says the Tigers should embrace the pressure in the remaining weeks of the season as they look to engineer a way out of trouble.
City head to Sunderland on Saturday looking to inflict a first Championship defeat at the Stadium of Light, just as they did to Sheffield United at Bramall Lane in their last victory.
The Tigers’ position at the wrong end of the table looks perilous, but three points on Wearside would be a huge boost in their survival quest, especially with a massive game against Cardiff City to come in South Wales next Tuesday night, closely followed by another huge home meeting with Plymouth Argyle.
Crooks says the speed at which games come around in the second tier gives City a big opportunity to put a string of results together, even if that’s something they’ve found increasingly difficult throughout this season.
Saturday’s 1-1 draw at home to Norwich City, which saw Crooks bag his second Tigers goal since arriving from MLS side Real Salt Lake last month, did at least break the run of successive defeats and give Ruben Selles’ men something to build on this weekend.
“This league, you know what it’s like,” Crooks told Hull Live. “There’s a game every other day. You’ve just got to use it. We’re so lucky to be in the position that we are, I think, of being able to play football at such a high level and in front of a big crowd, and you’ve got to kind of embrace that pressure and enjoy it and go out there with a positive attitude and try and win a game of football, so that’s what I’ll be looking to do and I know the rest of the lads are as well.”
Fans and players alike have been left frustrated throughout the stuttering campaign, and Leeds-born Crooks admits he understands their frustrations, but says City have nothing to fear going to the Stadium of Light on Saturday.
He said: “That’s the game, isn’t it? It’s the emotion of the game, we feel it, the fans feel it, everyone feels it. I think after the game at Sheff United that we had to back it up and obviously, we didn’t do that, but in this league, if you put two or three wins together, you, you see how tight it is, you do climb the league pretty quickly but it’s alright talking about it, it’s another thing doing it.
“We’ve shown against the bigger teams that are up there at the top of the league that we can mix it with them. I think that’s the Championship, isn’t it? Any game, if you perform on the day then you can you can pick up three points.
