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We've come a long way since we last met at the Turf in early November. A 1-0 defeat in a shocking performance led to Steve Cotterill leaving the club two days later to be replaced by Owen Coyle.
With that win against us Hull were left one point clear of us although we had a game in hand, now it is them a point behind with the game in hand so our form since that meeting has been very similar.
The fake tanned Phil Brown has made few changes to his squad since and, like the Clarets, there were no permanent signings in January, but again like us he's strengthened with three loan signings during 2008 to add to Fraizer Campbell who was already there on loan.
Those loan players are Simon Walton from QPR, Mark Tyler from Peterborough and just last week West Brom defender Neil Clement signed on loan.
Recent form has been good and Saturday's defeat at leaders Bristol City was their first reverse in seven games. And although they have drawn their last two home games only West Brom have won there since the first week in October.
This will be our third visit to the KC Stadium and as yet we are still awaiting our first goal there let alone our first win. We haven't played at Hull very often but it is now over fourteen years since we netted a goal there and that was John Deary's late winner in a 2-1 victory on New Year's Day Bank Holiday 1994, a game played in the pouring rain.
Phil Brown will have to decide whether to bring back Michael Turner and Jay-Jay Okocha who are both available again after missing the defeat at Bristol City. Turner, who scored the winning goal at the Turf this season, was out suspended and was replaced by new signing Neil Clement whilst Okocha was on his way back from injury and was used as a substitute.
It is thought that both of them will have to wait for their chance to get back into the starting eleven and that Brown will probably name the same team as Saturday. If so they will line up: Boaz Myhill, Sam Ricketts, Neil Clement, Wayne Brown, Andy Dawson, Richard Garcia, Ian Ashbee, Dean Marney, Henrik Pedersen, Fraizer Campbell, Caleb Folan. Subs from: Mark Tyler, Michael Turner, Simon Walton, Jay-Jay Okocha, Nicky Featherstone, Ryan France.
Owen Coyle has spoken of having difficult choices to make and of having to leave out players who are playing well. He particularly referred to Joey Gudjonsson who he said was very unlucky not to play on Saturday.
We've got as stronger squad as we've had for some time at Burnley and Coyle knows he'll have to use them all at some stage. It may well be that he'll change things again tonight depending on how we choose to play.
On the other hand he might just go with the same eleven although I think that Robbie Blake is likely to come in for Ade Akinbiyi and we could start with the team that finished on Saturday.
Our team could be: Brian Jensen, Graham Alexander, Clarke Carlisle, Steven Caldwell, Jon Harley, Wade Elliott, James O'Connor, Chris McCann, Kyle Lafferty, Robbie Blake, Andrew Cole. Subs from: Gabor Kiraly, Stanislav Varga, David Unsworth, Mark Randall, Joey Gudjonsson, Ade Akinbiyi.
When the year is coming to an end you want to leave it showing some intent as to what might be ahead in the following year. Our last visit to Hull came on the last Saturday of 2006 and there was little intent on view.
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Our guest reporters on the headlined their reports with 'Tigers tear sorry Clarets apart' and 'Burnley sink without trace in Humberside horror show' and that just about sums up a performance in a game that was lost with two goals in the opening quarter of the game and there was never a chance of us coming back.
Hull simply pumped the ball forward and we couldn't deal with it. Craig Fagan gave poor Stephen Foster a torrid time and he was withdrawn after only half an hour. What a relief that must have been for him and the only consolation for the Clarets was that by then the scoring had ended.
The only reason the score did remain at 2-0 was mainly due to goalkeeper Brian Jensen who, as at Barnsley, was our man of the match. He made several good saves to prevent us from taking a major hammering.
This really was our first downright bad performance of the season and took our run without a win to six, three draws and three defeats. There were more downright bad performances to come.
The teams were;
Hull: Boaz Myhill, Ryan France, Michael Turner, Damien Delaney, Andy Dawson, David Livermore, Dean Marney, Ian Ashbee, Craig Fagan (Nicky Featherstone 89), Nicky Barmby (Nicky Forster 75), Jon Parkin (Stuart Elliott 79). Subs not used: Matt Duke, Sam Ricketts.
Burnley: Brian Jensen, Stephen Foster (John McGreal 30), Michael Duff, Wayne Thomas, Jon Harley, Wade Elliott, James O'Connor (Kyle Lafferty 30), Micah Hyde, Chris McCann (Alan Mahon 45), Steve Jones, Gifton Noel-Williams. Subs not used: Garreth O'Connor, Graham Branch.
Previous 20 Seasons | |||||
Season | Div | Ven | Result | Att | Scorers |
1992/93 | 2 | a | 2-0 | 5,751 | Heath(2) |
| . | . | h | 2-0 | 9,974 | Heath Slawson |
1993/94 | 2 | a | 2-1 | 11,232 | Davis Deary |
| . | . | h | 3-1 | 10,574 | Pender Eyres(2 1pen) |
1995/96 | 2 | h | 2-1 | 10,613 | Nogan Allison(og) |
| . | . | a | 0-3 | 4,206 | . |
2005/06 | C | h | 1-0 | 11,701 | Akinbiyi |
| . | . | a | 0-0 | 19,926 | . |
2006/07 | C | h | 2-0 | 11,530 | Duff Noel-Williams |
| . | . | a | 0-3 | 17,731 | . |
2007/08 | C | h | 0-1 | 9,978 | . |