by Sam Todd

Created on: May 28, 2008   Last Updated: October 31, 2008

Hull City, whose history spans 104 years, went into this season with one of the most unwanted tags in football. For the men from Humberside played for a city who were the largest in Europe never to have hosted top flight football. Their chances of altering this statistic looked unlikely; Hull had finished 21st the previous year, avoiding relegation by one place and seven points.

Long-standing chairman Adam Pearson had also exited the KC stadium hotseat, to be replaced by Paul Duffen, who had been involved in unsuccessful attempts to buy Cardiff City and West Ham United in the past. Manager Phil Brown must have been hoping for consolidation at best. As it happened, though, The Tigers fortunes changed markedly after Christmas. An impressive end of season run of 8 wins from their last 11 games not only took Hull into the play-offs, but also gave them a shot at automatic promotion, falling short as West Brom and Stoke secured the points they needed.

But up stepped local lads Dean Windass and Nick Barmby in the play-off lottery. Both men were key in their 6-1 aggregate win over Watford, before Windass struck a memorable volley over fellow surprise act Bristol City in the final at Wembley to end their century-long wait to reach the top tier of English football. Also key was on-loan Manchester United striker Frazier Campbell, whose 14 strikes helped propel Hull up the league, whilst captain Ian Ashbee and keeper Boaz Myhill could play for the same club in all four divisions; Hull were in the bottom tier as recently as 2004.

The Hull City story only serves to highlight the sharp contrast to the predictable nature of the top flight; The Football League Championship this year was predictably unpredictable. Though only West Brom showed anything like the quality required for the next division - one caller on 5 Live's 6-0-6 referred to them as "West Brazil" - very few could have predicted that Stoke and Hull would join The Baggies. Even fewer would have suggested that a Milan Mandaric backed Leicester City, notwithstanding the ridiculous amount of tinkering by the Foxes' chairman, who has changed his manager five times in the last 18 months, would slip through into the third tier for the first time in their entire history.

Coventry City under Iain Dowie were also expected to do well. In the event, Dowie was sacked mid-season and the Sky Blues stayed up by one point. Less surprising was the demise of Colchester and Scunthorpe. Arguably the two smallest clubs in the second division

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