Saturday 8 November 2014 20:37, UK
A frustrated Steve Bruce thought Hull City got what they deserved after a 1-0 loss to Burnley at Turf Moor on Saturday.
Ashley Barnes headed Burnley to their first win back in the Premier League when converting Keiran Trippier’s cross on 50 minutes.
Hull were then playing with 10 men for the final 20 minutes after their captain Curtis Davies was forced off with an injury when his side had already made three substitutions, and the Tigers could find no way back.
But the first half in particular, we were so poor it was unrecognisable for the team. It’s very rare in two and a half years I’ve been to the club that we’ve had to come out and apologise because that simply wasn’t good enough in the first half.
The win saw bottom of the table Burnley move to within two points from safety, while Hull - who have not scored in three straight games - stay two points clear of the drop zone in 14th place.
A disappointed Bruce told Sky Sports: “We haven’t really turned up - we turned up when it was too late with 10 men, we made a fist of it in the last 20 minutes and nearly got something out of the game.
"But the first half in particular, we were so poor it was unrecognisable for the team. It’s very rare in two and a half years I’ve been to the club that we’ve had to come out and apologise because that simply wasn’t good enough in the first half.
"From one to 11, I didn’t see any urgency, any desire, any real hunger to make sure that we got something out of the game and if you’re lacklustre like you are in the Barclays Premier League, then you’re going to get found out.
"And today we got what we deserved which was absolutely nothing."
He added: "We understood the situation – if we’d have won today, we’d have gone into the top half of the division and gone ten points clear of Burnley.
"All of a sudden now they’ve caught the gap and the sad thing for me is we’ve made it easy, we’ve give them that because we’ve not passed the ball, we’ve not shown any hunger, desire, whatever you need to win a Premier League game which was there in abundance a couple of weeks ago and that’s the frustration I have at the moment of saying ‘where’s that come from?’
"So we’ll have a look at it and make sure it doesn’t happen again."
