New signing from Manchester City Charlie Holt made a strong impression in his first game in City colours when he was instrumental in getting the under 21s into a winning position against Coventry at Leckwith in a disappointing 2-2 draw on Tuesday evening.
I say disappointing because City experienced a fade out in the final quarter of a game they had been fully in control of at 2-0 up during a first half where they played really well.
While the turnaround didn’t coincide exactly with Holt’s withdrawal around ten minutes into the second half, we certainly looked a better side when he was on the park. At 17, Holt was able to cope physically with under 21s football in a way that many of our young players of his age struggle to.
I get that you shouldn’t read too much into just one game, but, on that limited evidence, Holt looks ready physically for first team football and technically he impressed with his range of passing and ability to cope with a press while playing the number six role. Again, it’d be wrong to get too carried away after just one game, but Holt looks like a definite step up from the young players we usually pick up from Premier League teams.
Going back to Tuesday’s game, Hayden Allmark put us ahead with a far post volley from a Jake Davies cross and Herbie James’ good finish has us two ahead against a team that were second best by some distance at the time.
However, sloppy defending allowed Coventry to quickly reply and once they had equalised midway through the second period, the visitors took control as we completely lost our way. Despite this, the fact that we were so much better than our opponents for most of the the match means this should have been a win.
On to tomorrow’s visit to Wolves which is the first of a trio of matches within a week against the teams relegated from the Premier League last season. It’s also the third of what should be a quartet of matches against sides sitting in the division’s top four. Following our loss at Blackburn in the first match after the international break, few would have given us a chance of getting anything at Middlesbrough, but our draw there followed by a deserved win over a Birmingham side in great form at the time means that we can travel to the Midlands with some degree of confidence.
Wolves sit fourth in the table with, like us, two wins and a draw in their last three matches, but I don’t think I’m being harsh here when I say the one word summary of their season so far may be underwhelming.
Whether this is fair is arguable, as Wolves won only three times last season while compiling just twenty points – that’s a very poor return which suggests that life at the lower level may not be as comfortable as many thought it would be.
Nevertheless, Wolves should be favourites for Saturday’s game against a team that only has two points out of a possible eighteen on their travels – anything other than a home win would represent an improvement on last week’s impressive win over Birmingham as far as we’re concerned.
On to the quiz, the answers to which will be posted on here on Sunday.
60s. This lanky centreback is a Londoner and made a few appearances for the club that was probably closest to the area of the capital he was born in before his move to Wolves midway through the decade. He was mostly a regular selection as he clocked up close to two hundred league matches at Molineux. His next move saw him head north to wear stripes for a club in decline and he left them four years later following another relegation. His final move as a full time player saw him turn out for a team thats ground is shared with a prominent rugby side these days, but can you name him?
70s. This locally born midfielder began and ended his playing career with Wolves. Never a regular starter during his three seasons at Molineux, he spent a year playing for a team from Oregon before returning to the Midlands to play for a team that would have looked identical to Wolves if you were watching the two clubs play each other on a black and white TV during parts of this decade. It was at this club where he probably played the best football of his career and he become their Player of the Year in one of his four seasons with them. He stayed in the Midlands to play for another team you would have struggled to identify if you watched that black and white TV again before going on to play for a variety of sides from home and abroad, including one in Wales. His playing career ended at Wolves during their bleakest time. Our man also went into management taking charge of two non league clubs, one of which was a Welsh coastal outfit who play in green and black. Who is he?
80s. Destroy fleet in Cambridge or Wolverhampton! (5,7)
90s. Lurch into England international for a month at Molineux?
00s. During one of Dave Jones’ seasons in charge of Wolves they had nine players on their books who would have, or had already had, a spell at City. How many of them can you name?
10s. Which former Wolves player from this decade has been in the news this week for something that happened to him while he was out walking his dog?
20s. Ex Chelsea man from Tenerife turns up in South American capital!
Soon after the end of today’s match against Birmingham City at a sodden and wind swept Cardiff City Stadium I had a quick look on one of our opponents’ messageboards to see what they were saying about our best win of the season so far. Virtually the first message I saw was from some clown who said that there had been some strange results in the Championship today because of the atrocious conditions proving to be a leveling down factor which enabled the league’s poorer teams to “clog” their way to results they would not have got otherwise.
I’m sure the supporter concerned will not get to read this, but, if, somehow, they do, they should have a look at the match stats which, besides confirming we were clearly the better team, show that, in a match that was never dirty, we gave away ten free kicks and picked up one yellow card compared to twenty and two yellows from Birmingham.
I then had a quick look on what I’ll always call Twitter and found that a City fan had reposted something from a Birmingham supporter marveling at our ability to retain control of the ball while playing at such a high pace.
In a way, this echoed what I had thought when I read that first message – while players often say that they like playing on a wet pitch which enables them to pop the ball about that bit quicker, the pitch today was too wet really with some standing water and the ball not running consistently.
I daresay the conditions did not help Birmingham, but I’ve read a lot this season about how they’ve adapted their game by becoming a bit more direct so that the ball does not spend quite as much time on the deck as it used to – given the way we’ve played under BBM these last two seasons, the conditions hardly suited us more than Birmingham, in fact I’d say the opposite applied.
Birmingham came here on a three game winning run with eight scored and none conceded in that time. The best pre match prediction I saw from the Podcast tipsters being a 1-1 draw, all of the others had us down to lose with us conceding at least two. That’s understandable in many respects because I think last week’s 3-0 win over a good QPR side, who beat the jacks 5-0 today, convinced many that the bluenoses were the real deal as far as top two challengers were concerned.
I’ve seen quite a bit of Birmingham this season and have been impressed – I thought they were the better team in their opening day draw at Sheffield United, deserved their win at Wrexham and likewise at West Brom. I also watched quite a bit of their only defeat before today at Norwich and thought the better side lost.
Birmingham are like Wrexham in that they have the financial resources to compete with the parachute payments clubs on something like equal terms. Yet, believe me or believe me not, I had quite a good feeling about today’s match because, although three of our twelve matches (QPR, Portsmouth and Blackburn) could justifiably be described as poor, in the other nine we have to varying degrees justified BBM’s confidence back in the summer that we could be a “dangerous” team at this level.
That’s why I don’t mind us being written off beforehand – as confidence increases among the players that we belong here, we’re becoming the sort of side that you underestimate at your peril.
So, I didn’t rule out what would have been a shock home win for many, but, where I was completely wrong was in thinking that, if we did win, it would be by something like 3-2. – what I didn’t see coming was a single goal victory achieved with our first clean sheet in fifteen competitive games!
All of these positive developments have, of course, been achieved against a backdrop of never ending disruption to some elements of the spine of the team and there was more today with yet another injury to a centreback as Krystian Bielik had to drop out at the end of the pre game warm up with a groin problem.
City had already named their starting eleven with Callum Scanlon included in place of Chris Willock on the left, Will Fish coming in for the suspended Gabe Osho, while Perry Ng returned as captain in place of Ronan Kpakio. In the last minute reshuffle brought about by Bielik withdrawing, Joel Bagan moved to centreback, Scanlon back to left back, Cian Ashford going out to the wing and Jack Moylan dropping back to number ten with the fit again Yousef Salech brought into the team to lead the attack.
In his post match interview, Salech said he first knew two and a half minutes before kick off that he was in the starting line up. That may have been said half jokingly, but it did show that there was a lot of disruption to the team at very short notice and yet BBM spoke afterwards about his pride at how well his side had stuck to the pre game planning.
Birmingham, looking a confident and settled side despite the absence of their striker August Priske, edged the first few minutes and there was a dangerous, driven cross from their right which Fish did well to get a touch on to send the ball out for a throw in,
However, that was to be the visitors’ first half attacking highlight as they reached the interval with not a single goal attempt, on or off target, to show for their efforts.
This was a real feather in the cap for the makeshift back line with Ng in particular doing well to subdue the very much in form Liam Miller on Birmingham’s left. However, those in front of the back four played a huge part in stifling the fourth placed visitors as well with Alex Robertson increasingly looking like a class act at this level and Joel Colwill who I said had the best game I’d seen him play against Charlton I think it was, but he surpassed that here with his ability to win possession, keep possession, burst past opponents and get into attacking positions all seen to great effect – I honestly can’t name a man of the match on a day when everyone played so well, but many of those who did name one opted for Joel.
City went on to establish a degree of control, but never full control, as the half went on, however they were only to have three goal attempts to their name at the break. Importantly though, they had the lead and although it should have been by 2-0, they were happy to be just the one up in what was a tighter affair than expected.
Ollie Tanner, proving to be a real problem for left back Alex Cochrane because of the sheer variety of ways he looked to play when in possession, sent an angled drive into the 3,000 traveling fans from a promising position for one of our first half goal attempts while the others came from Salech.
The first one was from the penalty spot. All of a sudden, after two or three seasons when we barely got a penalty, we’ve had three of them in two home games. Unfortunately, the evidence so far is that, just like in 23/24 when we were being given them on a pretty regular basis, we’re not very good at them as we only have a success rate of one out of three.
Referee Tim Robinson pointed to the spot when Japanese midfielder Tomoki Iwta and Ng tried to reach Robertson’s corner – Ng did have hold of Iwta’s shirt for a second or two as the cross came in, but the fact that Ng’s shirt had been pulled to the extent that the number on his shirt could not be seen surely made the ref’s decision the right one.
After the controversy about who should take the second penalty against Watford, BBM indicated that Salech was definitely first choice in that regard, but here his effort was a poor one which enabled goalkeeper James Beadle to dive to his right to make a good, but hardly outstanding save.
Salech was much more impressive on 32 minutes when after a period of patient passing from left to right, Ng and Tanner combined to give the latter some space and I reckon he surprised Birmingham with a very early cross which tempted centreback Phil Neumann into thinking he could reach it only for Salech to bundle him aside and take a touch before guiding his shot past Beadle from eight yards for a very impressive piece of target man striker play.
City continued to give Birmingham little or no time to settle on the ball through the majority of the second half and they should really have been out of sight before the visitors roused themselves in the last fifteen minutes as City, perhaps, tired a little.
Salech shot and then headed just wide of the same post and the otherwise very impressive Ashford should have done better when we counter attacked impressively and Salech found him some ten yards out only for Beadle to block the shot which followed, then there was another effort from the same player which was blocked close to goal by Birmingham captain Christoph Klarer – this after a superb back to front passing movement which would have led to a goal to rival that one at Forest Green in a pre season match.
City brought on Willock for Tanner and Ronan Kpakio for Scanlon as Birmingham had one half chance and one very good opportunity late on through two of their substitutes – Marvin Ducksh volleyed over from around the penalty spot and then when the outstanding Fish headed into the path of Demarai Gray stood unmarked fifteen yards out, the otherwise underemployed Nathan Trott produced a good diving save to ensure we collected a well deserved third win of the season.
So, having taken four points off teams in the top four of the division in the last week City now find themselves six points above the bottom three and six points off eighth place and the last of the Play Off positions. Although the lack of squad depth remains a concern, current form suggests that we could be more concerned with the latter option mentioned above rather than the former if we could get a few more or our injured and suspended players available.
Before leaving today’s game, both BBM and goal scorer Salech spoke about how much a visit to Aberfan on Thursday by the squad and manager meant to them. It was the sixtieth anniversary of the awful disaster which saw a school and surrounding houses overrun by tarry slurry caused by a coal tip that was on top of a water spring sliding from its position above the village. There were 144 deaths with 116 of them being children and both manager and player made it sound as if the team had given that bit extra today in remembrance of the dead.
The under 21s won a seven goal thriller at Charlton yesterday with the goals coming from Hayden Allmark, Gabriel Keita and two more from their player of the season so far, Jake Davies – highlights of the match can be seen here.
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