Cardiff City did not deserve to lose 1-0 at home to Bristol City tonight. The BBC’s stats showed that they had seventeen goal attempts to four and five on target efforts to just the one by their opponents and those figures were a fair reflection on the flow of a game where the ball was heading towards the wurzels goal for much of the time.
In some ways, City played as well as at any time this season, some of the build up play was not just effective, it was easy on the eye as well and, having whinged fairly consistently about our central midfield over the past few weeks, I must say I think it’s been a good couple of games for the Marlon Pack and Joe Ralls combination.
On Tuesday Pack and Ralls were together in the sort of 4-4-2 formation which used to see City City midfields of five and ten years ago outgunned because they were outnumbered three to two, but our pair were dominant against Barnsley’s three, while tonight, with Neil Harris switching back to the usual 4-2-3-1, they had some support from Harry Wilson, but, with City forced to chase the game virtually from the word go, it was again more a case of two against three – our defeat certainly couldn’t be put down to us being outgunned in central midfield though.
If you were to distil the whole game down to just the goal which decided it, you could say that our left side, which was so good on Tuesday, lost it for us because, with little over a minute played, Joe Bennett’s careless pass presented Bristol with an opportunity to break and they did so intelligently and well as they switched the ball from their right out to the left and then back again to leave an overload which left Bennett exposed with Junior Hoilett nowhere in sight. Former Newport County loan man Antoine Semenyo got to the bye line and pulled back a low cross which Chris Martin knocked in from inside the six yard box with something like a hundred seconds played.
A simple finish then to end a well constructed move, but Sky’s cameras were later able to show that the reason Hoilett was absent from defensive duties was that he and Sheyi Ojo, our other winger, had got well ahead of the ball when Bennett’s pass went astray and neither of them were therefore able to shut down the space on either flank that Bristol were able to exploit.
As someone who has watched plenty of Bristol City Academy sides being beaten at places like Leckwith and Treforest, I must admit that I find it galling that Semenyo is just one of a number of players in those teams we’ve beaten who has made their way into the Bristol City first team and, in some cases, been sold for big fees. I’ll add the usual caveat about results not being so important at youth level here, but I do find it odd that while we’ve consistently been getting the better of them at age group level, it’s they who are producing the first team footballers, and often good ones, while we tend to send our youngsters on loan to places like Weston, Hereford, Barry and Bridgend and then release them.
Anyway, having got that off my chest, back to tonight’s match! So, after the blip that was the Barnsley game, things returned to normal as we yet again made life difficult for ourselves by conceding the first goal and, this time, while credit should go to our opponents for the way they exploited the opportunity we gave them, those words “we gave them” tell a too familiar tale as to why 20/21 is turning out so disappointingly so far.
Bristol scored from their one goal bound effort and, thereafter, had the occasional dangerous attacking moment, but in many ways, it was a holding operation for them after that. Actually, the words “holding operation” are suggestive of them just sitting back and defending, but that’s not true, I thought they did try and get forward when they could, but, for the most part, they were forced back by us.
Unfortunately, it too often was a case of us doing well until we saw the whites of our opponents eyes – smooth build ups would come to nought because of a lack of composure or not quite enough quality on the final ball or, when we got that part of the game right, the finishing wasn’t.there.
As so often with Cardiff though, it was set pieces which told the real story – there were some terrific dead ball deliveries by Pack especially which saw Keiffer Moore, first, force a fine save from David Bentley (it seemed to me that the striker’s header was destined to hit the post rather than the net though) soon after the goal and then around the half hour mark, Moore should have done better than head over from six yards. There was also a free kick from Pack in the second half which eluded the three City players who had got free of their markers and a cross in open play from Wilson that Hoilett could not convert from point blank range, with Ralls unable to keep his hooked effort when the ball broke to him low enough.
There were plenty of other half chances for City, but the efficiency Bristol showed when scoring was never really there for us and so we’ve now lost three out of six at home and go into the November international break spluttering along in lower mid table.
This, plainly, isn’t good enough for a team which were in the Play Offs last season and, to my mind at least, has a squad which is technically better when it comes to attacking than last year’s group. However, for all of that ability, our goalscoring record would be feeble without those three on Tuesday. At the other end of the pitch, we aren’t defending as well as we were doing post lockdown either – having full backs injured so often isn’t helping, but that’s not the sole reason for it. For example, we’re worse at defending set pieces than we are when we’re attacking from them at the moment and you don’t get to say that too often about modern day City teams.
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Good morning Paul – Thanks as ever for your accurate summary of last night’s disappointing affair. The early goal giveaway was careless but preventable as we lost our shape completely. In any event the final cross to Martin (it had to be him as he has caused us damage before) went through Nelson’s legs and Morrison did not act quickly enough to snuff out the danger.
But I was confident that we would not lose, in fact I fully believed that we would win as the game progressed. Some neat play, impressive mid-field performances with plenty of attacking movement. Sadly though, there was no end product, and I put that down to a lack of composure when it mattered. And Wilson was as guilty as anyone.
Moore’s headed miss when he came at pace to meet Pack’s excellent delivery was a case in point. It seemed to me that he was too keen on powering the ball rather than placing it as it sailed well over the bar. He was, however, unfortunate when his earlier attempt was well saved by Bentley low down and could well have crept in via the post – but we will never know. Moore’s acquisition was to be the answer to our mis-firing striker problem, and last night he should have added to his season’s tally of three. I just wonder are we placing to much expectation on his willing frame, and is there just a sense of desperation about his play. and in this context, do we really have to continue to lump the ball forwards for him to win headed knockdowns which he does frequently, bit to no one in particular. Time for a more thoughtful approach from defenders. With some pace on the pitch, there really is no excuse.
We are now closer to the bottom of the table than the top, and with two away games next after the international break, the optimism of a top six finish is fast disappearing. The division may not yet have settled down form wise, but there is a real need for the Management team to address our shortcomings now in this supporter’s eyes, otherwise I fear the winter months will harbour more sad results.
Thanks again for your post match write up Paul.
One or two observations from me for what they’re worth.
As some on some social media sites have already said, their early goal came down Bennett’s side of the pitch and not for the first time since he’s been with us. Now I’m not laying the blame solely at Bennett’s door because as you’ve already pointed out, he was lacking in cover due to Hoilett being elsewhere. However, it’s happened a number of times in the past and I know many fans have questionned Bennett’s defensive abilities. He can be great going forward but I’m certain some opposing managers target him specifically.
Another issue is again as you’ve said too, is the chances not being taken, when they’ve been created. Normally we’re moaning that we never create enough chances. Is there any pleasing us? Lol. Anyway the issue here is that of actually hitting the target and putting the opposing keeper under pressure. If you’ve ever spent some pre-match time watching the players go through their warm ups, all pre-covid of course, then it wouldn’t have escaped your attention that when it comes to the shooting practice bit, our players seem incapable of hitting the target. Shots which are teed up for them are more likely to be hit over the bar or past the posts with the odd one being saved by our keeper and even rarer ones actually hitting the net. It’s sadly a concerning regular occurrence and has become a bit of a standing joke between my mate and I, which sadly we haven’t been able to do for a number of months now. It seems an issue which hasn’t been addressed by any of our managers. Is it something that should actually concern us as it’s “only practice”?
It seems to be taking an age for any form of consistency to hit our current squad and I hope we find some soon as we will be slipping further down the table after today’s games.
Thanks Paul.
Too much to hope for a repeat of Tuesday I guess. We are the City after all!
Another poor start – losing track of how many “one-off” errors we are making at the back this season. And then having to play catch up. Too often.
Agree that I thought we actually played well – especially in the first half. The interplay and passing were of good quality and I felt that we would surely overcome the deficit. However, the litany of missed chances each game is proving to be a regular frustration.
Too many snatched shots and misdirected headers and little by way of anticipation around the box for any second balls or flick-ons.
I think we can all see an improvement in the quality of set piece delivery with numerous opportunities for our attackers or big defenders to hit the target. However, every game we see headers wide or over the bar from excellent positions and shots blazed wide through poor technique. As Iain has noted above – not a surprise to those of us who used to watch the warm up practice drills back in the good old days of actually going to a match!
Not great going into an international break with a loss and hope the next block of matches brings about the required improvement and points, otherwise it’s going to be a real slog of a season with lots of restless natives.
Again, thank-you, Paul and fellow posters for your comments. They offer food for thought.
Last night, City once again lost their mojo and it all was pretty frustrating viewing from down at CF11. Yes, we had 17 shots, but all bar five were either high, wide or a combination of the both. Once the visitors were 0-1 up, before the second minute was ended, they seemed pretty comfortable.
Gone was the pleasing high tempo and quick closing down of the 442 formation of the Barnsley game, replaced once more with the stolid 4411 fare of most of this season. Again, our wrong-sided, ‘wingers,’ rarely got to the bye-line and cut inside continually. By so doing, we never turned the Bristol City defence. Moore has been criticised in some quarters but expecting a chef to come up with a tasty banquet with few ingredients is a bit rich. Once more, the glimpse of light, seen by the positive adjectives and adverbs from the Shorter Oxford Dictionary utilised in writing about our previous home game has been closed to them.
If Glatzell is not fit for more than 30 mins then why eulogise about the young Mark Harris and not pick him? After the pleasing freedom seen against Barnsley it was back to normal. It was back to the Borg mentality from Star Trek: the collective being less than the parts.
Yes, Bennett chose wrongly when faced with two attackers but could not Morrison have done a bit more in preventing the shot for the goal? Why is it that Bennett is expected to do what others in front of him don’t and then to also have to defend?
The visitors did a job on us. Their manager was cuter than ours. They played a 433 against our 4411 (I don’t think it’s a 4231 as generally our two wide players are a bit too deep). In effect it was like playing against Brentford all over again. Against just one Bluebird striker, their two full backs pushed on to join their two wide attackers in a two-against-one on our fullbacks. Wilson and Ojo were generally dealt with by the visitor’s midfield. And so it stayed for the first hour of the game. Once it was evident that our, ‘friends,’ from over the water were so deployed surely City needed to pen the visitors’ fullbacks back by attacking them repeatedly?
Almost more concerning to this City fan of over six decades as what transpired on the pitch, were the after game comments from Neil Harris. Was it an, ‘outstanding performance’? Yes, there were some nice passages of play but I’m sure we’ll come to our own conclusions as to whether it came into the outstanding category. Even with Wilson in our XI we are seeing how important Tomlin was to our second half of the 2019-2020 season. He scored or laid on over 20 goals. Whether Tomlin ever regains the fitness levels required for Championship football I do not know. But he is being greatly missed.
Now it’s 5 points out of 18 at home with one win in six Championship games. Or another way its 3 wins in 12 games (including the Lge Cup game). The Barnsley game and the odd 20 mins here and there, the football has been pretty dour this season. Our Manager’s football philosophy and fearful mind-set is becoming far too easy for opposition teams to overcome and this International break will offer plenty of time for Mr Harris to ponder these matters. Does he have it within him to change? Or will he continue to do the same, believing for a different outcome? Unless the corner is turned soon it will become an even more rocky ride for the Management team at Cardiff City Stadium.
A swallow doesn’t make a summer and after the Barnsley match it seems everyone had suddenly wondered is this was the change.
Well 100 seconds into this game you had the answer. A typical poor pass given away when it wasn’t required and with lots of defenders we first of all failed to stop the cross and then with loads of blue shirts in the box the centre forward who isn’t the fastest man put the ball in the net. What on Earth was Morrison doing.
Cue the different culture from the Barnsley game …….NOT
We still played the ball sideways, back and to the goalkeeper as if the players were afraid to create anything.
Yes we are putting more crosses in thankfully and the midfield used the ball intelligently at times.Thank goodness for Ralls and Pack as the rest of the team seemed to treat the ball as a hot potato.
The game was so one sided until we reached the penalty area, here we had no one who could create and when we did, the powder puff attack usually made a mess of anything that looked like a chance.
Any manager worth his salts would play their players in the best position. To put Wilson on the wing was nothing short of diabolical. Play to the players strengths for goodness sake.
Whether it’s me or not but we have a really powder puff attack because they actually don’t look ahead and if they do they usually kick or head the ball skywards or completely make a hash of it.
I really couldn’t stomach much more of this to be honest, enough is enough
When a manager who played centre forward always seems to favour defensive strategy when there is always a good mistake ready to happen defeats me.
My season ticket money wants more and wants excitement, At least with Dave Jones it was you score 3 we will score 4 or sometimes It was 2, but that was value for money and although NW got us promoted that feeling has never returned since Jones left. I know that football may never get us back into the premier but to be honest I have never enjoyed that premier football.
I would rather enjoy a match rather than watch what we are doing at the moment. You never know how things may change and we go into the premier playing good attacking football like wolves.
I couldn’t watch the game as I was on the ferry coming home from spain. Try as I might, the connection was too slow.
What I was hoping to read today was. Harris has been sacked.
This may be controversial but I dont feel he can motivate players.
Take post lock down. How many goals did we concede because we were notoriously slow starters. Especially after the half time break.
6 home games and 2 of those we have conceded a goal within 5 minutes. We are then chasing the game with players out wide who are scared of attacking the byline and pulling the ball back.
Isn’t that how Bristol scored.
Now let’s look at motivation.
Began didn’t put a foot wrong yet he is dropped for bennet who always has a mistake in him. A young lad who needs games not dropping for an error prone player.
Glatzel dropped after playing well against Barnsley. What is that doing for his confidence. Zilch.
Nope harris needs to go now while we can still salvage something from this season.
Morrison spoke to the players and apparently said he doesn’t want a mediocre season and end up mud table.
I dont think it will be a mediocre mid table season. More like staving off relegation.
Again, some great replies which don’t need much comment from me, but here’s a few thoughts on some of the points made;-
BJA, there was a post on the messageboard I use comparing how much more Wigan played the ball into Moore’s feet than we do – we’ve spent quite a bit of money on bringing in big centre forwards presumably to get on the end of crosses from wingers who don’t cross that often and I can think of two who we end up saying they’re better with the ball at their feet than they are when it’s in the air (Zohore and Glatzel) and it seems to me that Moore could be added to that list. We always seem to be surprised at this, but the clue is in the name of the game – the only footballer I’ve seen who might have had better ball control when the ball was played to his head compared to his feet was Alan Gilzean and it probably wasn’t true about him either!
Iain, I always used to be sceptical when the point about how unsuccessful our shooting was in the warm up routines until I actually watched one and had to admit it wasn’t very good – I do feel that the modern football is harder to control when shooting than the ones from the seventies and eighties I used to play with were because you could get more purchase on them, but I daresay it’s a case of what you’re used to and our players would probably not know anything different to what they use now.
Steve, it sounds like I’m on the fence here, but I agreed with both managers to an extent. The expected goals score (granted, it counts for nothing, but I’d say it is usually a decent indicator of how a game panned out) had us winning by something like 1.7 to 0.6 which equates to quite a big victory under this system. I think Neil Harris went over the top a bit in his after match reaction, but, on the other hand, if that same game was played in exactly the same manner ten times, I don’t think we’d end up losing more than once or possibly twice. However, within that, I could understand where Holden was coming from to an extent, because his side defended well and clinically cut us open once in a manner we couldn’t repeat – I can see where you’re coming from where you say Holden won the battle of the managers.
Barry, I thought we had an attacking outlook on Friday, but that was probably down to us conceding within two minutes and, by and large, I agree about our defensive mindset – in that respect I see little difference between Messers Warnock or Harris. In our last five derby games against the wurzels and the jacks, we’ve only scored the one goal (Danny Ward’s late winner at Ashton Gate last season), that says so much about our attitude, our creativity and standard of finishing in these matches.
Pr, I wonder how many supporters missed our early goal against Barnsley? I wouldn’t be surprised if there were a fair few who did because, say, they decided to make a cup of tea before settling down because they figured “we never start games/halves well”. I don’t really blame Morrison too much for the goal, but his reaction was like quite a few others in our side in that they looked like they weren’t quite “into” the game.
Just one other point I want to re-emphasise – people look at figures for shots on or off target, but there are other situations where a goal could have been scored if some of our players had shown the sort of anticipation you might expect from a natural goalscorer – I think there were two or three of those – I reckon if our manager had have been playing in that game when he was in his pomp. he would have got himself a couple of goals.