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Hull City's Chester glad it's time to recharge the batteries after rollercoaster ride

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AT 2.50pm eight days ago those manic scenes from the bowels of the KC Stadium were beamed out live to the nation.

There was a disbelieving Robbie Brady with mouth agape swallowed up by a scrum of celebrating team-mates and then Ahmed Elmohamady teaching dance moves that would be repeated across a jubilant city that night.

Try and find James Chester in amongst the melee, however, and he is nowhere to be seen.

Fearful that Hull City's 2-2 draw with Cardiff would have disastrous consequences in the Championship promotion race, he retreated to the dressing room unable to watch events from Watford's heavily-delayed game with Leeds United at Vicarage Road.

Only the "moans and groans" of City's coaching staff from an adjoining room told Chester his dreams of being a Premier League footballer had been realised.

"When we came off the pitch there was just confusion," said Chester. "I had no idea what the score was in the Watford game and I was worried we'd blown it.

"Football is never simple and it was only when I came in the tunnel that I saw the score. I couldn't watch.

"I went and sat in the changing room well away from the TV.

"I could hear the coaches watching their TV in their manager's office so I could hear every moan and groan, but I couldn't bring myself to watch it.

"It was only when I heard everyone celebrating that I went and joined in. It was unbelievable."

Chester walked back down the same corridor on Wednesday night for the Tigers' promotion party at the KC Stadium.

A sense of achievement was finally beginning to sink in. But only just.

"We've spent the last few days looking at each other and just smiling like idiots," he added.

"I don't think it's sunk in yet, but it soon will I'm sure.

"I'm not sure you could write that last day. It was amazing really.

"For us to go so close to winning it with the penalty and then to go down the other end and end up drawing was horrible.

"Then it was that 10-minute wait for the Watford game to finish and it was probably the longest 10 minutes of my life."

The all-consuming 2-2 draw with Cardiff, where the Tigers missed one penalty before conceding another all inside stoppage time, was the final act of perhaps the club's greatest season.

Winning automatic promotion to the top flight for the first time in City's 109-year history, Steve Bruce's men have broken new ground in 2012-13. The huge reward is a £120m windfall and, more importantly, brings Premier League football back to the KC for the first time since May 9, 2010.

"It's been a brilliant season for all of us," said Chester, whose 44 appearances meant no one played a bigger role in City's success.

"I don't think anyone gave us a hope at the start of the season, but I always felt we had as good a chance as anyone after coming so close the year before.

"We all benefited from that experience and with the other lads that came in with the manager, we've improved as the season went on."

Chester, who joined the Tigers from Manchester United in January 2011, is already one of the club's longest servants and a veteran of two near misses on promotion, first under Nigel Pearson and then Nick Barmby.

A final standing of 11th in 2010-11 and eighth in 2011-12 brought key lessons but also, in Chester's eyes, gave City room to develop free of pressure under Bruce this season.

"I was looking back on the season and it seems like we just kept on picking up points without anyone paying any attention to us," he said.

"That probably worked in our favour and we clung on. Before you knew it we'd won automatic promotion and we were in the Premier League.

"Even with eight games to go we still weren't everyone's favourites to go and do it.

"But I can remember the Burnley and Huddersfield games in particular, where we just ground it out.

"They weren't pretty but they were good games for a defender and we got the only goal. Those are the performances that really matter when you're chasing promotion."

Now Chester can begin dreaming of 38 rounds in the Premier League.

Although schooled by Manchester United's academy for over a decade, his only first-team appearance came as a substitute for Gary Neville in the 2008-09 League Cup.

"It's important that we all get away and have a good holiday now," said Chester.

"We've got a lot to look forward to, but I'll be spending time with my friends and family back in Warrington and recharging the batteries.

"We've all achieved what we wanted and it'll be a dream to look forward to playing in the Premier League."

Meanwhile, City's final-day promotion will help end speculation hanging over Chester's long-term future.

With little more than a year to run on his original three-and-a-half-year deal signed upon his arrival in January 2011, a new contract offer tabled in December has remained unsigned by the gifted defender.

Further talks will be needed to iron out the finer details this summer but Chester does not envisage any more obstacles.

"I just wanted to concentrate on my football at such an important stage of the season," he added. "Now that we've done it I'm sure it will get sorted sooner rather than later."

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Hull City's Chester glad it's time to recharge the batteries after rollercoaster ride


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