They keep stats on almost everything these days in football, but there’s some things that you don’t need them for.To give a couple of Cardiff City examples of what I mean, we discovered in tonight’s 3-2 home defeat by Hull City that we are half the side we can be when Ryan Wintle and Cedric Kipre aren’t playing.
With both of those players out because of a one match suspension for five bookings we were reduced to a return to the turgid long ball stuff I’d hoped we’d seen the last of. Wintle and Kipre bring a degree of poise that wasn’t seen tonight and I’m afraid their absence offered further evidence of the adage that you don’t realise how important some players are until they’re missing from the team.
Wintle has an ability to switch the ball either way when receiving passes from keeper and centrebacks that looks pretty straightforward and easy to emulate, but clearly isn’t because it seemed that without him, we decided not to play as we’ve tried to throughout the season. Instead, apart from a short spell when we looked in control at 2-1 up, we were second best and 3-2 suggests a closeness to the match that wasn’t really there.
Kipre contributes to the playing out from the back game we’re trying to implement, but he’s also the rock our defensive game is built around and we looked lost at times without him.
Also missing was Jaden Philogene who has been in such good form recently and, again, you think he’s cemented his place in the starting line up by not being there tonight.
Returning to stats, I can only assume that City do not keep them for the number of times a player loses possession, I say that because surely Mark Hudson would not be so keen on picking Sheyi Ojo for every game if a record of how often he gives the ball away was kept.
I try not to single out players for criticism on an individual basis on here, but seeing Hull’s first two goals come as a result of him losing the ball inside his own half just brought my frustration with him to a head.
Okay, Ojo may have had a bit of a case for a foul against him with the first one (I didn’t think it was mind), but it happens far too often week in, week out with him. Sadly, he doesn’t look the player he was in his first spell with us – he wasn’t great then, but at least he was inconsistent, now, sadly, he’s very consistent.
Vincent Tan was there tonight to watch what I’m pretty sure was his first live game since before the pandemic (the BBC reported that it was his first home game since Palace in 2019 – we also lost that one 3-2) and beforehand came the so predictable news that Mark Hudson had been offered the manager’s job until the end of the season.
I don’t think Hudson has done a bad job so far, but I can’t shake off the feeling that an “interim” manager with a record like his would not be getting offered employment until the end of the season at other clubs.
City’s dismal first half performance could perhaps have been put down to the sort of thing you sometimes see when an on loan player signs for a club permanently – his performance levels drop once his future is sorted out and I wonder if there was a similar reaction on a collective level from the team because of the news of Hudson’s contract offer? Alternatively, and flippantly, maybe it was that City saw Sunderland’s first half showing against us on Saturday and were so impressed that they decided to copy it.
Suffice it to say, if our first forty five minutes on Saturday was our best half of the season, tonight we provided our worst so far. Hull were in front in just four minutes after a lovely cross from the left byJacob Greaves was turned in by Dimitrios Pelkas from close range with the left side of City’s defence sleeping.
Hull could have added to their lead when Greg Docherty’s deflected shot was superbly tipped over by Ryan Allsop, but the keeper should have been left with no chance when Ryan Longman glanced a close range header wide.
All City could offer in response was a well struck Joe Ralls shot which flew a yard wide with goalkeeper Nathan Baxter beaten.
With Hull committed to playing out from the back, Baxter had given City some hope as he often looked ill at ease with the ball at his feet and a couple of minutes after the break City we’re level courtesy of a mistake by the keeper.
Baxter played a short pass to Jean Michael Seri, but Ralls was in quickly to direct the ball to Callum Robinson who turned and beat the keeper from twelve yards.
City, who had been ponderous in possession, were now playing better (they could hardly be worse), but it was still a surprise to see them go ahead just after the hour mark when Robinson flighted a fine cross in from the left that was headed in on the far post by Gavin Whyte.
The Northern Ireland international had been brought on with Mark Harris for Romaine Sawyers and Neils N’Kounkou who were both poor on the night and they helped to bring about a more urgent and confident approach from City that suggested they could see the game out.
However, having scored more than once at home for the first time, they chose this night to concede three for the first time on their own ground in a league game this season.
Regan Slater turned the game on its head with two goals in two minutes, the first was a low shot from twenty yards after he got away from Ralls too easily and the second was to finish off a move which had a fluency and cutting edge that City couldn’t match.
Slater’s finish from eight yards gave Hull a deserved win, but they did have a brittleness about them that better sides than City could have exploited. However, they also contributed virtually all of the good football as, increasingly, City reverted to high balls into the box – an approach which made you wonder if they thought Flint, Morison and Moore were still playing for us.
Only when Curtis Nelson headed a Ralls corner not too far over the bar did an equaliser look possible, but it was not to be and so it’s beginning to look like City could be on their way to unwanted hat trick of seasons where they lose more home matches than they win.
Finally, City’s women’s team retained their place at the top of the league, but lost their 100 per cent winning record when they were held 1-1 at Pontypridd Town. It looked like Megan Bowen’s long range goal had won the game for City, but an equaliser in added time rescued a point for the home team.
Reading’s defeat aside, it was just about as bad an evening of football as we could have imagined with a really disappointing result in an important match, self-destruction on and off the pitch, and other results going against.
On 70 minutes it was looking so different having recovered from poor first half to earn a winning position, coming from behind and scoring multiple goals at home. 12th place was (temporarily) within our grasp. We were doing it without Collins, Kipre and Wintle which Sofascore has as our top 3 performers this season.
Fast forward to full-time and we’ve lost the game, the crowd have turned on the team and (expecting a defeat against a Sheffield United side now looking to put things right) we could go into international break much, much closer to relegation spots.
Every point matters this season, every player matters and it’s so rare for players to perform their best if being the target of the boo boys. We’re simply too small a club to have targets like that.
I don’t know if Hudson holds card too close to his chest after Morison was so open, sometimes brutally so, but while it’s pleasing to hear that the club’s plans are “good” and communication with owner is “good”, we really want more detail to build excitement on. I think he generally speaks well, and we have got better under his watch, but I want something more because this club needs an injection of excitement and manager plays part in that.
Tan’s interview reveals more and he’s right to call out fans who want investment, failing to understand financial fair play rules, or fail to recognise we’ve had a decade plus of knowing we’re going to have team at end of season when that wasn’t always case under Sam or Ridders, but he’s still blaming past managers for bad transfer signings when they could get away with it because there’s something missing in the board room. I’m not necessarily calling for director of football but communication from the club is infrequent and in recent past has been error-strewn (did Choo really reveal club business on supporter’s bus, why does Dalman treat supporters so rough and why the need to call out the Supporters Trust?) so something there to better handle communication and knit different parts of the club which are going in right direction (better youth development, better scouting, better style of play) so it’s not so hard to see what we can get excited about.
A few weeks ago we were miles better than Birmingham, who are hardly run smoothly, but they have lots to be happy about now whereas we’re looking forward to break from CCS. F**k me, I’m so annoyed at last night.
Yes DJ, the days since Tuesday have made me reappraise my original opinion of the Hull game somewhat. At first, I was a bit more let’s keep a sense of perspective about things mainly because I believe this squad look a lot more convincing than last year’s when they win. We’ve won seven so far and I’d say it was only Norwich where the opposition had a realistic claim that they deserved something out of the game – I still believe that when we play well, we look a lot better than a relegation battling side. However, I have to acknowledge that I cannot think of one out of our ten defeats where we could claim to have deserved something (Huddersfield would come closest I’d say, but they were a bit better than us) from the game.
Hudson is definitely more “mainstream” in his media presentation than Morison was and I can only hope that the “riot act” has been read to a few behind closed doors since Tuesday. As I said in my piece, I don’t like singling individuals out, but Ojo keeps on making the same mistakes (he was the same two years ago, so he’s not going to change) and, on Tuesday, they really cost us. He shouldn’t be in the team as far as I’m concerned, yet Hudson appears to have an awful lot of faith in him (more than the man who signed him did). Sadly, Sawyers, who I was really looking forward to seeing in a City shirt, is another one who needs to be giving more- he has a football intelligence that Ojo lacks and wasted a big chance for himself on Tuesday.
Looking at the pictures of Vincent Tan watching the game on Tuesday, the thing which struck me most was how deserted what used to be called the Director’s Box was. I know Tan was always one for standing up watching the game and he never seemed to converse with those around him that much, but he just seemed isolated on Tuesday. I’ll try not to get party political here, but there’s a parallel to be drawn between the Tan ownership and the current UK Government in that they both came to power at around about the same time and I think in any administration it becomes hard to keep things feeling vibrant and fresh after a while. Inevitably, a degree of familiarity and jadedness seeps in over time and the inherent faults the bodies contain become clearer and take on more importance.
For me, we reached that point with Vincent Tan a few years ago and, if he is going to stay, then the club needs “freshening up” within the current financial constraints. As you say, an obvious, and relatively cheap, way of doing that would be to bring some one in with more of a football background to offer advice and ideas. I’m guessing however that Vincent Tan is still bruised by the Malky Mackay years and, instinctively, doesn’t trust “football types” – i daresay he thinks he brought in the sort of person you allude to in Steve Morison and there was a hint in what he said in midweek that there was something else in the background which played a part in his sacking. I’m guessing here, but I think Vincent Tan is currently even less minded to bring in a “Director of Football” type than normal.