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<\/p>\nThe Hull FC coach has revealed that Herman Ese’ese pulled out of Thursday’s game to illness.<\/p>\n
22:50, 30 Jul 2026Updated 01:43, 31 Jul 2026<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Hull FC prop Herman Ese’ese.<\/p>\n
Herman Ese’ese missed Hull FC’s game at Huddersfield Giants on Thursday night due to tonsillitis, Andy Last has revealed.<\/p>\n
The Black and Whites prop \u2013 eight games into his return from a nine-month layoff with an Achilles injury \u2013 missed the clash in West Yorkshire, with illness now cited as the reason.<\/p>\n
Ese’ese was named in the 21-man squad on Tuesday lunchtime but unfortunately was stood down on Tuesday afternoon after contracting the illness. Yusuf Aydin came into the side in the only personnel change, with Hull going down 22-16 to the Giants at Accu Stadium.<\/p>\n
Speaking to Hull Live post-match, Last said: “It’s a viral infection, tonsillitis. He was off on Tuesday. And we found out Tuesday afternoon that he had contracted viral tonsillitis. So he was unable to play.<\/p>\n
“He’s not very well, but I don’t think it disrupted the team much. Max Wood and Yusuf Aydin did good stints and Hugo Salabio and Harvie Hill have been starting for us. It was obvious Huddersfield came after that middle unit and they got some joy there.”<\/p>\n
Asked if Ese’ese will need an operation, Last said: “I couldn’t tell you. He’s on the meds. He saw the doctor. He’s on fluids and he’s taking his meds \u2013 and we’ll see how he is over the weekend.”<\/p>\n
As for the contest, Last pointed to Hull’s lack of ability to get control of the ruck and individual errors as reasons for the defeat. The Black and Whites took the lead twice through two Davy Litten tries but were unable to kick on with a killer punch, with Huddersfield, who made too much ground and dominated the ruck, turning a 16-12 deficit into victory.<\/p>\n
“We had a lack of composure,” Last said. “And probably the scars of being in close games over the last four or five weeks and not being able to get it done \u2013 and then just a lack of confidence.<\/p>\n
“Our inability to control the ruck speed is also proving a real problem for us. Our middles had a big job on and it’s happened two weeks in a row now \u2013 we’ve clearly got some work to do in that area.<\/p>\n
“Then unfortunately for us, our decision-making wasn’t good enough and proved to be costly. We came up with the wrong plays at the wrong times. We didn’t put the right kicks in to build pressure and we didn’t come up with the right quality of kick that we needed, and then we forced some passes where we needed to be a little bit more patient, so yeah, it was disappointing.<\/p>\n
“We didn’t build pressure. We had some opportunities in the first 20 minutes but we made some individual errors and those individuals don’t need to make those errors. They proved to be very, very costly, but what’s disappointing is when we do turn the ball over, we can be on their try line, but the ability to let a team march up-field is a real concern.<\/p>\n
“It’s not good enough defensively. We need to limit the run metres a team is getting on us. It’s a big thing for us. Teams are rolling us. It’s happening most weeks.<\/p>\n
“We talk about it. We practice it. We do a lot of contact and wrestling, but in the heat of the game, teams are rolling us a bit too easily. It’s a concern.<\/p>\n
“Teams find a way to get over the advantage line and we don’t help ourselves when we turn the ball over. We make errors and that takes energy from you, and when you’re on the back foot it’s hard to stop a team when they get that momentum.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Hull FC coach has revealed that Herman Ese’ese pulled out of Thursday’s game to illness. 22:50, 30…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1121162,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[4102],"tags":[255042,127714,115424,4151,6531,79,16,15],"class_list":["post-1121161","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-andy-last","tag-herman-eseese","tag-hull-fc","tag-rugby","tag-rugby-league","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1121161","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1121161"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1121161\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1121162"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1121161"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1121161"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1121161"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}