BOWEN AT THE DOUBLE FOR TASTY TIGERS
HULL CITY manager Nigel Adkins revealed a prematch pep talk did the trick for Jarrod Bowen, as his two goals inspired the victory that lifted the Tigers out of the bottom three.
Bowen, who opened the scoring after just six minutes, had netted just once in his previous nine matches.
“Jarrod hadn’t scored for a few weeks and I said to him to just go and enjoy playing football,” Adkins revealed.
“Sometimes things can start to build up a little bit and you just need to enjoy playing.
“You can see he had that in his performance and he worked for the team, scored two and could have had a couple more.”
“I’m really pleased for all the staff and players. We’ve come away from home and again played really good football.”
“We’ve scored three, could have scored a couple more, and the spirit and commitment of the players is there for all to see.”
Bowen opened the scoring after just six minutes when he collected Fraizer Campbell’s layoff and cut inside Joel Lynch before shooting past keeper Joe Lumley from just inside the penalty area.
Worse followed for the home side after 22 minutes, when Markus Henriksen was allowed to flick Bowen’s right-wing corner into the net from close range – the Norwegian’s first goal of the season.
Polish winger Pawel Wszolek hit back less than two minutes later by finishing off a lovely Rangers move.
After nice link-up play involving Massimo Luongo and Nahki Wells, Angel Rangel threaded a pass to Wszolek, who slotted the ball between keeper David Marshall’s legs.
While the home side were clearly galvanised by their goal they continued to look vulnerable at the back.
They had a lucky escape when Kamil Grosicki breezed past Rangel and crossed from the left to an unmarked Jackson Irvine, who headed over.
Nevertheless, QPR were unfortunate not to be level by the interval.
Marshall kept them at bay with two fine saves, diving to his left to keep out Wells’ low shot and later palming away Lynch’s excellent header from Luke Freeman’s corner.
And full-back Rangel, who scored twice at Stoke last weekend, rattled a post with a volley after Hull had only half-cleared another Freeman corner. An onslaught from QPR seemed certain, but it never materialised. Steve McClaren sent Tomer Hemed on just after the hour mark in an attempt to breath new life in to his team.
McClaren took a risk by bringing on Hemed for Geoff Cameron, who had been performing an important role in front of a fragile back four.
Six minutes after the change, Hull carved QPR open and helped themselves to a third.
Bowen was sent through by Grosicki and tucked away the loose ball after his first effort had been saved by Lumley.
Hull were then comfortable until Freeman netted his second goal in as many games.
After the match, QPR boss Steve McClaren said; “I felt at half-time that we’d win, but we were always susceptible to that third goal. That’s what happens when you throw caution to the wind. It didn’t pay off today.”