For all the limp ineffectiveness of Hull City's display against Portsmouth at the weekend, a game every commentator and reporter bemoaned as being without parallel in its awfulness, at least we did seem to hit on the best available central defensive partnership in the squad.
To keep the duo of Anthony Gardner and Kamil Zayatte together for the foreseeable future, however, requires a number of factors. The main one is that Gardner stays fit. He has been with the club for 15 months and has missed 90 per cent of the games through one injury or another. He looked out of puff towards the end and made a couple of errors, but right now we can touch wood that his match fitness will actually return through the cunning method of actually playing matches.
Zayatte is a more complex character. He doesn't have an injury issue and, gratifyingly, seems to be playing at an above average level within a team that is underperforming to a considerable extent. He is prone to brainstorms and howlers that more experienced, more reserved players in his position simply do not commit, and if that wildcard side of his game can be tethered, he is a tremendous defensive asset.
There is also the issue of Zayatte's recent performances in the midfield holding role, a position perennially a trouble-causer thanks to Ian Ashbee's season-long absence, George Boateng's fractious relationship with Phil Brown and, most irritatingly of all, Seyi Olofinjana's poor form after such a big transfer fee and a great debut at Chelsea. Olofinjana got away with it against Portsmouth but Brown will need to balance out the need to play his strongest available defence against a capacity for flimsiness in the midfield.
It was a positive step forward to play Gardner and Zayatte, not just because it meant Gardner was fit again, but also it allowed Brown to drop the terrible Ibrahima Sonko from the team. Sonko is, mercifully, only on loan from Stoke City but has proved to be an immobile, hesitant, one-dimensional defender whose strength in the air is not even remotely matched by any ability or coolness on the deck. The decision to partner him with youthful debutant Liam Cooper at Liverpool made the 6-1 scoreline almost wholly predictable.
Cooper himself was considerably less culpable than Sonko that day, although many national outlets claimed the decision to blood a teenager for a Premier League bow against the world's most fearsome centre forward was the main reason City were thumped so harshly. It wasn't. Cooper acquitted himself well, while Sonko looked a rigid, panicky, positionally-dubious mess. That Cooper did emerge with dignity and credit intact was quite an achievement, and not one intended to patronise him.
There is room in the future for Cooper in the City defence, but with the Tiger Nation yearning for Michael Turner's natural replacement to be plucked from nowhere, it is at least a boon to see the best available defensive duo within the squad playing together. Their continued presence depends on Gardner's fitness and Zayatte's head, as well as Olofinjana's return to the kind of form that justifies his fee. There are a lot of "ifs" here, but they are all we have right now.
Other options do exist, but Steven Mouyokolo is way too raw and pretty much sits alongside Cooper as far as the need to be gently phased into this level of football is concerned. Kevin Kilbane is sturdy enough, and certainly less of a problem than when he plays in midfield, but you cannot choose a player in one position simply because it prevents him from causing damage in another. If the day comes when Kilbane is one of the two best central defenders to the Tigers, then it casts awful aspersions on the other available defenders and, frankly, will result in others being brought into the club. Kilbane will never, as a consequence, be regarded as a first choice defender.
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