What Ruben Selles said after Hull City beat Sheffield United in January - it clearly impressed COH Sports | OneFootball

Selles masterminded a stunning victory against his new employers five months ago

New Sheffield United manager Ruben Selles has just a couple of weeks until his first pre-season at Bramall Lane gets underway.

The Spaniard has been earmarked as COH Sports' ideal replacement for Blades legend, Chris Wilder, whose second stint in the S2 hotseat came to an end on Wednesday following a period of speculation regarding a potential exit.

Selles also fell victim to the brutality of management just last month, with Acun Ilicali opting to remove the 42-year-old from his position as head coach at Championship and Yorkshire rivals Hull City, despite the fact he achieved the club's short-term goal of avoiding relegation to League One after an extremely inconsistent campaign.

After being poached from Reading last December, Selles oversaw 29 games in charge at the MKM Stadium, winning nine of those and possessing the fourth-best defensive record in the second tier during that time, with two of those combining to great effect at Bramall Lane as the Tigers stunned the promotion-chasing Blades.

Ruben Selles masterminded "statement" Hull City victory vs Sheffield United in January

Prior to City's trip across Yorkshire, the former Southampton boss had ended a 13-game wait for a victory which had stretched back to October 1st under his predecessor, Tim Walter, defeating Swansea City 2-1 before also defeating Blackburn Rovers and Millwall away from home, as well as staging a dramatic comeback to earn a 3-3 draw against eventual champions, Leeds United.

By the time the televised encounter in the Steel City rolled around, Selles had already begun to make his imprint on the Tigers squad, with Joe Gelhardt, Matt Crooks and Kyle Joseph forming a new-look creative force alongside Abu Kamara.

Crooks sent initial shockwaves around Bramall Lane as his curling effort rounded off a sublime counter-attack on six minutes, before Matty Jacob prodded home his second-ever goal for the club, with a Harrison Burrows own goal rounding off the scoring with two minutes to go.

As a result of the unexpected three-point haul, Hull were able to climb out of the bottom three whilst denying the Blades a chance to go top of the table for a brief period at least, with Burnley and Leeds playing out a goalless draw three days later.

Speaking to the press after Hull's joint-biggest winning margin of the season, Selles described it as a "statement performance."

"Obviously, the victory comes with the performance. I think we were very solid in the things that we did today. I know there is some good things in this team, and I expected the team to have character and play how we wanted, and I think we saw those things today.

"We have been talking about getting the key moments of games on our side, and that's what we did today," he added.

"I think when you play against a good team and you sit low and wait for things to happen, you won't get anything, and I think we showed that we can go and press them high up the pitch."

In his own post-match assessment, Wilder was also very complimentary of how Hull became one of only four sides to take maximum points off the Blades on home turf alongside the top two sides and Millwall.

"I've got to say, congratulations to Ruben and his side. Getting the first goal tonight was key. And, then I thought they defended very, very well and compact," he said.

"They made it difficult for us, there wasn't much space for us to play."

COH Sports were also impressed by Ruben Selles' Bramall Lane exploits with Hull City

After it was confirmed that the Valencian had penned a three-year deal with United on Wednesday, a club statement also referenced Hull's 3-0 success among other references which detailed why Selles was Steven Rosen and Helmy Eltouky's prime target.

"Spaniard Sellés successfully kept Hull City in the Championship last season, despite taking over with the club bottom of the league, with an impressive win against United key to their survival," a section of the statement read.

It is clear that Selles' knowhow of AI and data-driven models is a key factor in the decision, with COH Sports making it no secret that this is the model they are pressing forward with in terms of recruitment as they hope to successfully emulate the likes of Brighton and Hove Albion and Brentford, who have established themselves as Premier League sides in the past decade.

As for the Tigers, they opted to replace the Spaniard with Sergej Jakirovic. The Bosnian signed a two-year deal in HU3 after recently maintaining Kayserispor's position in the Turkish Süper Lig, and Selles will be finding out when he makes a swift return to his former employers when the EFL fixtures are announced at 12PM next Thursday.