Nigel Pearson’s honest assessment of Bristol City win and ‘dubious’ penalty decision against Hull

Nigel Pearson praised Bristol City’s work ethic after their narrow 1-0 win against Hull City at Ashton Gate on Saturday.

Nahki Wells’ second-half penalty was enough to earn the Robins the three points after Cyrus Christie handled Anis Mehmeti’s cross.

The result sees Pearson’s side move up to 13th in the Championship, and extend their unbeaten run to 12 matches in all competitions.

At times it was far from pretty, but Pearson recognised his side's determination. “We worked hard today against a side who defended their box with a lot of commitment,” he said. “We got into some really good positions in the first half, whether it was the cutting edge or quality with their defending, it was a mixture of all of it (that they didn’t score).

“We still looked dangerous in the second half and I thought we finished the game strongly. The important factor today was that we won it because there have been lots of those types of games, it could have been a missed opportunity or felt like that.”

One of the missed opportunities that the manager was no doubt referring to was in the reverse fixture at the MKM stadium at the start of the season. The Robins had two clear penalty appeals turned down that day, and conceded a spot kick that was soft, to say the least.

Pearson’s side could’ve closed the gap to the play-off places if results had gone their way, but while they remain nine points off sixth, their run of form will have them full of confidence that they can push into the top half - or maybe even cause a mighty upset against Premier League giants Manchester City on Tuesday night.

“It’s quite significant for other results too and it keeps us in contact with the top half of the league which I think is a really good thing too. It’s also nice to go into a game like the FA Cup game on the back of a good result. 12 games unbeaten, whatever anybody says, is a real upturn in form for us.”

The spot kick against Hull means penalties in back-to-back games for the West Country side, after they waited 469 days for one prior.

Tigers’ boss Liam Rosenior described the penalty decision against Christie as ‘dubious’ after the match, but Pearson admitted his reluctance to feel any empathy for Hull.

“I can’t have too much sympathy because he’s not been on the receiving end of 469 days like we have,” he said. “I’ve not seen it, I understand a ball travelling at that pace might feel as though it’s an injustice but I’ve not seen it so I can’t really comment.

“We’ve had so many stonewallers dismissed by officials, I don’t want to start talking double standards about things like this. It’s rather ironic that if you look at last week’s game and this week’s, we have added another three points to our total based on two decisions that have gone our way.

“Last week was a stonewaller but you look at Sunderland who were a minute away from winning that game and that’s the only point they’ve got in the last three games. It just shows you what the Championship is like.”