Quakers put out welcome mat for former manager

Just as there was a fairytale for Quakers under Little a decade ago when they won the Conference and old Fourth Division, the old maestro is destined to finish in the play-offs at the end of the regular season with Hull, who almost went out of business three months ago.

Two gifts, and to a lesser extent, some poor refereeing, made sure of the final outcome of this match - the Quakers' first home defeat in nine matches.

The only good thing to come out of the afternoon was that Darlington are safe from relegation, barring four heavy defeats.

The weekend's results aided the Quakers cause as Torquay lost at Plymouth, and they have still to play Barnet, who have just two games remaining.

But there was a familiar Little stamp on the Hull performance. When Quakers were chasing titles, how often did you see them throw away a lead?

There was certainly no throwing caution to the wind those days, and once Hull had gone 2-0 up, it was the same again.

They allowed Quakers plenty of possession in the second half, but only a couple of chances.

However, there were some strange decisions from referee Mark Cowburn, in particular regarding a crunching clash between Olivier Bernard and Hull's Gary Brabin, which saw the Frenchman booked and Darlington assistant manager Mick Tait sent from the dugout for making his views rather too forcibly for Mr Cowburn's liking.

Darlington manager Gary Bennett, just like the fans, had a frustrating afternoon.

"Their first goal was a ricochet, and to be honest, I don't think Alex Jeannin knew anything about it. The ball could have gone anywhere.

"The second goal was a bad goal to give away. We told the players before the game that there were to be no backpasses to Andy because the surface was quite bobbly, and his clearance was charged down.

"But if you take the two goals away, I thought we created enough chances to get something out of the game. We got the ball down and passed it about, but maybe at times our final ball was poor, and the quality wasn't there.

"It was disappointing that we had enough of the play, but didn't make it count.

"Our day was summed up by the first goal. It was just one of these days when no matter what we did, we were never going to score."

Little, meanwhile, thanked the home fans for the standing ovation given to him before the game.

There was a nostalgic chant of "There's only one Brian Little" from the Tin Shed, and the former Aston Villa and Leicester boss saluted them in return.

He said: "It was a nice welcome back - it's not very often that two sets of supporters give you a nice reception like that.

"Sometimes in those situations you can't be sure how people will react, but I always thought it would be all right on Saturday. It was a great day for me."

Even more so considering that Quakers, who lost Mark Kilty with an ankle injury after just a few minutes, handed his side the initiative to Hull early in the game.

After just seven minutes, Brabin - who was a Darlington target in February - drove a free-kick into the box where it was helped on by the giant Kevin Francis.

However, skipper Craig Liddle, in trying to drive the ball clear, could only strike Jeannin, and it bounced off the Frenchman into the top corner of the net.

Quakers created enough chances to draw level.

They nearly equalised within two minutes, when former Hull player Phil Brumwell crossed superbly from the right, only for Paul Musselwhite to block Glenn Naylor's header on the line.

John Williams, who went off in the second half, headed weakly at Musselwhite instead of nodding the ball back to Naylor, while Richard Hodgson's trickery on the left created a heading chance for Naylor which was blocked.

Just as it seemed Quakers might snatch the equaliser before half-time, Hull took a stranglehold on the game.

A poor back pass by Jeannin put Collett under pressure, and the keeper's clearance struck the advancing Andy Holt, and John Eyre floated the loose ball over Collett's head into the net.

The second half started brightly from a Darlington point of view, but faded.

Brumwell nearly scored his first goal for four years, but he was just off target with a right-foot shot, while Musselwhite fumbled a low effort from Brian Atkinson, but recovered to block Hodgson's follow-up strike.

But after Williams volleyed just side from the edge of the area, the chances dried up until near the end, when Naylor put a flying header just wide from a right wing cross by Mark Convery.

Hull nearly got a third near the end, but David Brown shaved the post from the edge of the area.