Explaining Hull City’s Early Season Premier League Success

Three weeks ago, people expected Hull City to be winless by this point – most likely drawless, too. This is not what has transpiried in reality.

Instead, Hull are third in the Premier League table with seven points from their opening trio of matches. On top of this, they are the only team in the division who have yet to concede a goal.

They haven’t had a particularly favourable run-in, either. In their first game of the season, they took on Michael Carrick’s Manchester United, causing a major upset when they defeated the Red Devils by a score of 2-0 at the KC Stadium.

Since then, they’ve played fellow promoted team Coventry City and Aston Villa. They defeated Coventry, but were held to a goalless draw against Villa, despite arguably having the better chances.

But how have they done? How have the Tigers rocked the Premier League apple cart to such a degree? Today, that’s what we’ll aim to find out.

Hull City 2026/27 season stats

	Won	Lost	Pts
Hull	2	0	7

Sergej Jakirovic’s style of play

Head coach Sergej Jakirovic knows what he is working with. He understands that, player for player, his squad is outmatched by virtually every other team in the Premier League.

As such, he sets up with a solid back five and a midfield bank of four just in front of them. This leaves lone striker Oli McBurnie looking isolated, but his energy and physicality makes this far less of an issue. He isn’t there to score goals – he is there to harass defenders and hold the ball up when it comes to him.

With little in the way of interplay, Jakirovic encourages his players to move the ball as directly as possible. In their opening three games, they have had an average possession share of just 28.7%.

While Hull do often sit in, Jakirovic likes his wingbacks to push up high and cross the ball into the box whenever they’re in possession. This is their main route to goal – rather than play through teams, Hull play around them.

How long can Hull keep it up?

Eventually, Hull will inevitably find a team who can successfully create overloads and breach their backline. It may well happen this weekend – Xabi Alonso’s Chelsea have done an impeccable job of opening teams up thus far, even mustering a goal against the normally-erudite Arsenal.

Still, Hull can be very proud of their start to the season. With some pundits tipping them to rack up a worse points total than what Derby County managed in 2007/08, they’ve certainly upset the odds so far.

However, they will struggle against teams who can match them for physicality. This is their key advantage over teams – they can’t outplay them, but they can out-fight and out-muscle them.

This will only work for so long, of course. It’s also worth saying that they will have issues against teams who do not play into their hands. By standing off and forcing Hull to come out, holes will inevitably appear.