Soccer-Hull one step from Premier League after ending Millwall's hopes


Soccer Football - Championship - Play Offs - Semi Final - Second Leg - Millwall v Hull City - The Den, London, Britain - May 11, 2026 Hull City's Mohamed Belloumi scores their first goal past Millwall's Anthony Patterson Action Images/Matthew Childs

LONDON, May 11 (Reuters) - Hull ⁠City were one Wembley final away from a return ⁠to the Premier League after ending Millwall's hopes with a ‌2-0 away win in the Championship playoff semi-final second leg on Monday.

Second-half substitute Mohamed Belloumi broke the deadlock at The Den, after the first leg in ​Hull ended 0-0 last week, when ⁠the winger curled a 64th-minute ⁠stunner into the far corner.

The goal shocked Millwall, who finished the ⁠season ‌third overall and missed out on automatic promotion by one point to Ipswich Town while Coventry City clinched ⁠the title, and Belloumi was not done yet.

He ​made the run ‌and fed the ball through to Leeds United loanee Joe ⁠Gelhardt to ​score the second in the 79th -- a minute after he came on -- with goalkeeper Anthony Patterson getting a hand to the ball but ⁠unable to stop it trickling over the ​line.

Hull became the first second-tier team since Derby County in 2018-19 to reach the Wembley Championship playoff final after finishing the season sixth.

Millwall ⁠had been seeking a return to the top flight for the first time since 1990, while Hull last secured promotion to the Premier League in 2016 and were relegated again the following ​season.

The playoff final, dubbed the 'richest game in ⁠football' as the gateway to Premier League wealth, will be held ​at Wembley on May 23.

Southampton and ‌Middlesbrough play the other semi-final second ​leg on Tuesday after also ending the first match goalless.

(Reporting by Alan Baldwin in London, editing by Christian Radnedge)

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