Acun Ilıcalı stood at Wembley Stadium in London on the eve of Hull City’s play-off final and said he was carrying more than one emotion at once. The Hull City owner told Anadolu Ajansı he felt proud, happy, worried and “7-8” feelings at the same time as his team prepared to face Middlesbrough for the final place in the Premier League.
“We are one step away from realizing a miracle,” Ilıcalı said, framing the match as the culmination of a season that has carried Hull from pre-season doubt to the brink of promotion. He said the club had been viewed as a team for 21st or 22nd place before the campaign began, a far cry from the side that has reached the play-offs and now needs one more win to go up.
The owner said he believed the squad was strong enough to finish the job, and he pointed to the club’s transfer work as a major reason for the turnaround. Hull, he said, had been “very successful” in the market and had come a long way since he took charge after the team had only just been promoted to the 1st League and was second from bottom. Under Şota Arveladze, he said, the club first managed to stay up. Last season, Hull finished seventh. This season, it reached the play-offs.
Still, Ilıcalı said the final stretch had not been smooth. He said a scouting scandal disrupted preparation and left the team with both an advantage and a problem. The players, he said, spent eight days working on Southampton before plans changed three or four days before the final. Wednesday was a day off, Thursday brought one training session and Friday was a light workout. In the end, he said, Hull prepared for its opponent with only one tactical session. “There is a disadvantage, yes, there is a problem, yes, but we are here to overcome these,” he said. “We will fight to the end.”
The tension around the match has been sharpened by the scale of what is at stake. The winner at Wembley earns the last promotion spot to the Premier League, and Ilıcalı said the club’s supporters have invested themselves completely in the outcome. Hull was allocated 35,000 tickets and 34,000 were sold, he said, adding that the city is far from London and that London is expensive. “The whole city has tied its hope to the club,” he said, describing a sense of responsibility that has followed him throughout the season. He said he had been in this year for 150 days and that he had seen nothing but support since day one, saying that love had motivated him.
If Hull wins, Ilıcalı said his first aim will be simple: to have fun. He said the children were very tired and that he would make gestures for them if the team won, before adding, “I am very confident in the team.” For Hull City, this is the kind of night that can turn a near-miss season into a defining one. For Ilıcalı, it is the moment when the club’s rise, and the pressure that comes with it, comes down to 90 minutes at Wembley.
