Reds beat Hull for third straight win

Cauley Woodrow opened the scoring late in the first half which the Reds dominated then the visitors held onto their lead in a more even second half. 

The result took Barnsley off the foot of the table and halved the gap between them and safety from six points. It is the first time they have won three straight Championship games since early in the 2016/17 season while and their first back-to-back away victories at that level since later in that campaign when they won at Cardiff and Nottingham Forest. It is also their first run of three successive Championship clean sheets since 2010. 

Luke Thomas replaced Kilian Ludewig in the only change from Saturday’s win over Middlesbrough at Oakwell, as the Reds returned to their 4-4-2 diamond formation.

Home goalkeeper George Long fumbled a Jacob Brown header wide of his goal after a deflected cross by Thomas. Hull’s Jon Toral then blazed across the Barnsley goal from a very tight angle on the left of the box. 

Chaplin could not control a Woodrow throughball which would have left him with only the goalkeeper to beat then Long beat him to a raking Alex Mowatt pass into the area. 

Thomas exchanged passes with Chaplin on the edge of the box before skipping around a defender in the box but his shot from the right ten yards out was well over. 

Barnsley looked to be denied a blatant penalty in the 32nd minute when Woodrow and Chaplin attempted to exchange passes in the box before the former was clearly fouled by Jordy De Wijs. But no penalty was given, possibly because the referee played advantage as the ball broke to Thomas whose shot from the edge of the box was cleared off the line by Matthew Pennington. 

Brown headed a right-wing cross over the bar then Chaplin had a shot from the right side of the box turned wide by Long. 

The goal eventually came from a left-wing cross by Chaplin which was badly spilled by Long and Woodrow was there to tap in his 14th of the Championship season. 

It was almost 2-0 on the stroke of half-time when a long ball put Brown clean through on the right but Long came off his line to make a good one-on-one save. 

Hull made two changes at the break while Clarke Oduor was replaced by Ludewig. Long nearly gifted Woodrow another goal seconds half the restart when his sliced clearance outside his box on the right went straight to the Barnsley man who had to shoot quickly from 45 yards and it went wide. 

Substitute Martin Samuelsen – a former Barnsley trialist – forced Brad Collins into his first save of the night as his header from a right-wing cross was clawed out of the bottom right corner. 

Michael Sollbauer then came very close to his first Barnsley goal as, after Woodrow flicked a Mowatt cross, the centre-back chested the ball down and fired past Long but Pennington cleared off the line for the second time in the game. Halme headed the resulting corner well wide.  Sean McLoughlin headed a right-wing corner well wide in the 90th minute. 

Barnsley (4-4-2 diamond): Collins; J Williams, Halme, Sollbauer, Oduor (Ludewig HT); Mowatt, Bahre (Ritzmaier 51mins), Thomas (B Williams 74), Woodrow; Chaplin, Brown  Unused: Walton, Dougall, Schmidt, Simoes.  Yellow cards: Halme. Goals: Woodrow 42. 

Hull (4-2-3-1): Long; McKenzie, de Wijs (McLoughlin 54mins), Pennington, Elder; Lopes, Stewart, Maddison (Samuelsen HT), Irvine, Toral (Honeyman HT);  Magennis Unused: Ingram, Batty, Kingsley, Balogh.