Weekly review 11 July 2026.

Posted on July 11, 2026 by The other Bob Wilson

Ideally, I would have delayed this piece by a day so that it could include something about City’s first pre season match against FC Midtjylland which is taking place this lunchtime with a 12.30 kick off, but, I don’t think I’m going to have the time to write anything tomorrow morning, so I have to stick with what has become a normal Saturday morning routine in recent weeks.

The reason why I say it’s unfortunate that there won’t be anything on today’s game is that I can never recall a time in previous years when, well into July, I had so little to report in one of these reviews.

There have been a couple of things to note on the club’s website. Firstly, the club’s away kit for the coming season goes on sale for the first time at today’s game – it’s ecru, not white!

Predictably, there’s the usual price that cannot be justified for shirt, shorts and socks, but, unlike the home kit, there is a mitigating factor in that it’s a nice ensemble – well, I like it anyway! Unfortunately, just like with the home kit, there appears to be nothing on it commemorating the centenary of our FA Cup win. However, as I’ve heard it suggested that there may be something in the pipeline for us to wear a kit in our FA Cup games along the lines of Southampton wearing a very similar kit to the one they won the FA Cup in fifty years ago for their games in that competition, I should tone down any criticism of the club until we know what all of the kits we will wear in the coming season look like.

Secondly, I hope to find the time in the next couple of days to watch Straight Back Up which is a near two hour long review of our 25/26 season produced by the club – hopefully, I’ll be able to give an opinion of it on here next week.

Lastly, it’s still so quiet on the transfer rumour front, both incoming and outgoing. With Australia out of the World Cup, I had hoped that we’d have news by now about midfielder Cammy Devlin who it seems pretty well accepted now that we have a bid in for. There has been some info released on the player’s future in the last couple of days, but only to say that he has turned down an offer of a contract to stay with Hearts. So, we do know that Devlin will be on the move, but, a personal view is that, when you consider some of the clubs who are, reportedly, in for him, the chances of him ending up at Cardiff are slim to non existent.

If we really do have a contract offer in for Devlin, then it’s understandable why there is nothing coming to light about a Ryan Wintle replacement as it would appear that he is our first choice for that role. However, the only other rumour to surface in the past week that I’m aware of concerned a player who could be seen as a replacement, albeit a very inexperienced one, in the Wintle role.

George Hemmings is a nineteen year old central midfielder with Aston Villa who made a couple of substitute appearances for them in the Premier League last season and also gained Europa League experience.

Although you’d normally question whether a nineteen year old could hold down a regular place for a side in the second tier, it must be said that there are Villa fans who are arguing that he’s already good enough to come in and play a more regular part in their senior side in the upcoming season.

Another reason to feel that this is something of a long shot is that Sheffield United and Derby, both more established in the Championship than us now, are reportedly interested in Hemmings and this video by a Derby fan has the most action I could find of him.

Again, I’ll be surprised if Hemmings ends up at City in 26/27, but what I would say is that, based on that very limited video evidence, he does seem to be the sort of player BBM might go for.

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David “Dai” Woosnam.

Posted on July 10, 2026 by The other Bob Wilson

It was a great shock this morning to receive an e-mail message from Dai’s wife Larissa saying that, as a result of injuries suffered in a car accident he was involved in on Monday, he had passed away with the other person he was in the car with at the time currently receiving treatment in an Intensive Therapy Unit (Intensive Care).

Apparently, it’s still unclear as to the cause of the accident and I have very few details on it to pass on, but I’m afraid that we’ve lost a much admired and respected contributor to the blog and things won’t be the same on here without him.

I think one of the best things about this blog is that the small number of regulars who reply to my Cardiff City based musings are a civilised bunch and it’s very, very rare to have anything worse than a mild difference of opinion on here when discussing the club we all love.

I called Dai the “glue” which held the board together in an e-mail I sent out earlier. I’ll freely admit that our opinions on football, and aspects of life outside the game, fundamentally disagreed at times, but it never spilled over into anything more than the occasional, fairly mild “spat”.

From my own perspective, I couldn’t stay annoyed at Dai for long because I knew that, on the one occasion when we met up around fifteen years ago it must be now, he’d made a gesture which proved his basic likability and kindness – I was taken aback when he gave me an autograph book from his youth which I can tell you was filled with much bigger names than, say, City’s Welsh League team from 1959/60!

When it came to football, I soon learned Dai was an excellent judge of a player – he’d pretty often mention someone he’d seen in the lower divisions that was worth keeping an eye on and so often you’d see said player turning out in the Premier League or Championship within a few seasons.

Although he was often talking about events from over a half a century ago, I’d say Dai’s memory of City games from his youth was well nigh infallible and this meant that his tales, which often moved off into non footballing recollections from his interesting and well travelled life, were all the more entertaining and authentic.

There’s not much else to say really – I’m at an age now where I’m well aware of my own mortality and that of others within my age group. Sometimes, it’s not too much of a surprise to learn of the passing of a family member, friend or acquaintance, but this news has come very much out of the blue – Dai was just Dai and you almost felt he would always be there.

Of course, Dai was far more well known for his highly original Daigressing video magazines (that’s as good a way to describe them as I can come up with) which came out about once a month than anything MAYA based he did. It really is hard to describe what Daigressing was all about to anyone who hasn’t seen it because it was really was about anything and everything and Dai deserves tremendous credit for recognising as quickly as he did the endless possibilities offered up by a resource like You Tube.

Rest in peace, Dai, you’ll be sorely missed by an awful lot of people.

Posted in R.I.P. | Tagged | 9 Comments