Phil Brown may ponder how much more joyous life on the Humber would feel if Jimmy Bullard had only kept his knee uninjured seconds into his debut last January, eliminating him from the Hull manager’s plans until last month.

Even then the midfielder’s return stalled before Bullard’s second coming a fortnight ago preceded the 31-year-old’s late, late free-kick that forced an invaluable winner here against Stoke. This afternoon Bullard and his always-intriguing hair flowed all over the field to illustrate why Brown may, indeed, have made a shrewd move by acquiring him for £5m, plus his £45,000 a-week wages.

Bullard’s first-half performance, in particular, offered the home crowd an exhilarating reminder of why they love the old game, and their manager became such a local hero on taking over in December 2006.

Yet after 13 minutes the reverse emotion threatened to swamp the KC Stadium as Hull fell two behind. At this juncture Brown may have wished Adam Pearson, the new chairman, had placed the scotch and revolver under his seat on the bench for the moment when he could no loner ignore that the time had come for the honourable thing.

Within five minutes Guillermo Franco had headed home. The second came when Franco punted a diagonal ball from the left that plopped on to Jack Collison’s head and back off to loop over Matt Duke.

Cue Brown offering a puff of cheeks. But now Bullard took charge insisting Hull’s play should be constantly threaded through him, and on 26 minutes he yanked them back into proceedings.

Up he stepped to blast a free-kick from the left of the area which hit an onrushing Scott Parker before the ball skidded in of Carlton Cole’s head. Then, a Stephen Hunt free-kick was volleyed cleanly beyond Robert Green by a lurking Kamil Zayette a minute before the break.

When Faubert pulled Craig Fagan down Bullard – who else? – finished to make it 3-2, and that was a vintage half closed. Bernard Mendy’s red card and a West Ham equaliser from Manuel Da Costa ensued after the break. But, in Bullard, Brown may just have found the way to keep him winter warm.

Premier LeagueHull CityWest Ham UnitedJamie Jacksonguardian.co.uk

• Adam Pearson returns to Hull and seeks £18m in savings
• ‘We need to get back in shape’

Hull City’s new executive chairman, Adam Pearson, will conduct a major cull in the new year in an attempt to ease the financial problems at the troubled Premier League club.

Pearson took up his position in an official capacity on Monday after succeeding Paul Duffen, who resigned as the chairman and chief executive last week when it emerged Hull had debts of £27m. Pearson needs to find around £18m before the end of the season to make sure Hull remain solvent and his first task will be to reduce a wage bill of £40m – with the manager Phil Brown’s future also still up in the air.

While Brown has won a stay of execution for now, he may not be around to see the overhaul of the squad that Pearson intends to implement. Those players expected to leave include George Boateng, Bernard Mendy, Richard Garcia, Peter Halmosi, Caleb Folan, Daniel Cousin, Tony Warner and Ibrahima Sonko.

Pearson, who oversaw an annual wage bill of only £3.5m before he left Hull, then in the Championship, in 2007having appointed Brown the previous year, has vowed to get the club back on track and is confident of solving the problems he has inherited. He said: “We need to get back in shape to make sure the long-term future of the club is secure. It’s nothing that’s not retrievable, but we need to reduce the size of the playing squad, which in the Premier League is the key point.

“We’re certainly not in a situation where we need to sell players we want to keep. We just want to make sure that the club is being run efficiently and prudently. The position of the club is manageable going forward, but if it had been left much longer there was a danger of it becoming more serious. At this stage of the season, it’s achievable that we can turn this around.”

Pearson insists Brown will remain as manager until at least Sunday but refused to offer any long-term security. “Phil will be manager on Sunday but there’s no point me saying he’s got a job for life, that’s not the case,” Pearson said. “How secure is the manager? That’s a tricky one, I think if we don’t get results then that security goes down. Phil knows that, it’s the business we’re in. It’s been a difficult year and we need to achieve results quickly. We’re all in this together but we’ll have to see what happens over the next couple of weeks.”

Pearson has already opened talks with potential backers and is hopeful of securing investment before Christmas. He added: “It’s part of my remit to get extra money into the club. Every Premier League club is in a position where it is looking for external investment. It’s a big responsibility financially for myself and Russell [Bartlett, the club's owner] to manage alone and we are looking to ease that burden and provide a secure foundation for the club. I’ll be running the club from top to bottom, get it back on track and work strictly within the financial budgets that have been set.”

Premier LeagueHull CityPhil Brownguardian.co.uk