I can’t speak for others, but if you wanted proof of my changed attitude towards Cardiff City’s season since our 5-0 hiding at Sheffield Wednesday, then you would only need to see my reaction to Reading’s equaliser tonight deep into added time to secure a 1-1 draw which will enable them to go into their next match with a bit of positivity. However, it’s a result which ultimately leaves both teams disappointed.
In Reading’s case, the odds on them making the Play Offs have to have lengthened because, put simply, they did not win a game that was referred to throughout by the Sky commentators and analysts as a must win for them.
For City, the frustration is that, for the second consecutive match, we have conceded a goal past the ninety minute mark to turn a win into a draw. So, it’s now one win in seven and those of us who were predicting that the Swansea win would be just the boost to propel us into the final stages of the season very much in the hunt for a top six finish have been made to look pretty foolish, because two points in the four matches since then looks like the return of a side that has run out of steam.
The above explains why my reaction as the ball hit the net so late on to deny us the win was akin to a shrug. That’s one of the very few positives you can draw when your faint chance of prolonging your season beyond forty six matches disappears with about a month to go – an equaliser conceded in the ninety fifth minute is like a dagger through the heart from August to March, but in mid April with nothing really to play for, it’s a mild irritation.
That’s not to say that I don’t feel for City, because they didn’t look like a team going through the motions tonight. Sides like Swansea, Brentford, Barnsley and Bournemouth could have no complaints about City’s level of commitment, and, although it’s not really much of a compliment given the competition, I’d say this was probably our best display since the 4-0 stroll against Derby last month.
My initial reaction on hearing Mick McCarthy’s selection for the game was annoyance at its boring predictably as it came straight out of the Russell Slade lets ignore the youngsters handbook, but there is that argument about maintaining the integrity of the competition you’re in I suppose.
Wholesale changes for a game against a team still in the promotion race would be seized upon by others, but, for example, the signal sent out by the continued non use of Junior Hoilett from the bench is that he’s not going to be signing a new contract before his current one runs out in the summer, so, why not have, say Keiron Evans or Isaak Davies there instead of him?
The trouble with the integrity of the competition argument is that it has to apply equally to both the top and the bottom of the table and, so, assuming we don’t ring the changes for the midweek trip to Brentford, you can see the same logic applying to our last three matches unless one or both of Wycombe and Rotherham are already down when we play them.
Anyway, the only change from last weekend’s game with Blackburn saw Joe Ralls come in for Josh Murphy. I wondered if Ralls might be deployed as the most attacking member of what was definitely a central midfield three, but, instead, he was deployed in an advanced position on the left – he wasn’t playing on the wing, more like an old fashioned inside left.
Therefore, Marlon Pack and Will Vaulks were left to fend for themselves, as they have been for much of Mick McCarthy’s time here. They coped more than adequately in a first period that I thought we definitely had the better of though, as we went about our task with a fair degree of that very un Cardiff City like quality, composure. Not only that, where possible, we looked to build through the middle of the pitch rather than knock it long all of the time.
Unfortunately, the improvements did not extend into Reading’s defensive third and so for three quarters of the game, our sole worthwhile goal attempt was a Harry Wilson shot as he burst on to a poor clearance which drew a good save low to his right by home keeper Rafael.
In truth, I suspect our better than usual showing in the first half was as much down to Reading nerves as it was our good play. Certainly, they came out after the break like a team that had been given a collective flea in their ear by their manager and the third quarter of the game was played almost exclusively in our half of the pitch.
The complete inability to ease the pressure we were under for a minute or two was reminiscent of the second half of the Swansea match as Pack and Vaulks disappeared from the game and the ball stopped sticking with an isolated Keiffer Moore. There were also good blocks by all three centre backs to evoke comparisons with the derby game, but,it was never desperate backs to the wall stuff like so much of the Swansea game looked to be.
Indeed, apart from a Yakou Meite effort fired hurriedly over from around the penalty spot, City had few real alarms, but I still had the feeling that the sheer weight of Reading pressure would eventually wear us down and we’d concede a winning goal.
City had to find a way to get up the pitch and this brings me onto the vexed question of Mick McCarthy and substitutions. For the second successive match, our opponents make five of them while we made two and, again, we concede late on to lose two points.
This time, McCarthy’s subs changed the game from our perspective – Josh Murphy, so innocuous when in from the start against Blackburn, worried the Reading defence every time he ran at them and Sheyi Ojo was involved in the creation of the goal.
So, this time, our manager’s substitutions worked. Therefore, you might think this would encourage him to make one or two more, but, no, just like with Neil Harris before him, you can’t help thinking that, while Barnsley’s very likely top six finish owes much to their continuous use of their full quota of substitutes, there seems to be a reluctance by City managers to take advantage of the five subs rule.
Murphy created a chance for Moore which the striker wasted with a tame shot which was easily saved that ignored the fact that both Murphy and Wilson were well placed to his left and right respectively. Then the sub was involved again as Wilson was set free to lift the ball over the diving Rafael, but not with enough force to prevent home full back Andy Yiadom getting back to clear off the line.
These incidents showed that Reading were leaving themselves more open at the back in their pursuit of the win they needed and when Ojo was allowed to advance twenty yards with the ball to let fly with a well struck effort from around twenty five yards that Rafael could only beat out, Moore was quickly on to it and was kicked by home left back Omar Richards for a clear penalty.
Despite Ralls still being on the pitch, Moore is the man in possession so to speak when it comes to penalties and he was always going to take it. After lining up in exactly the same way as he had done with his previous two spot kicks in a manner which looked like he could only shoot to the goalie’s left, Moore proved that this wasn’t the case as he went high to Rafael’s right for his third nerveless penalty conversion out of three for City.
Moore then produced a lovely cross from the right aimed for Murphy that hone centre back Tom Holmes came close to turning into his own net as Rafael dived to his left to save and, despite the introduction of three subs all in one go, City were holding on pretty comfortably until Perry Ng was left to fend for himself out by the corner flag on City’s left for a throw in and one of the subs, Sam Baldock, got to the bye line to deliver a fine cross that was met by Meite (who always seems to score against us!) and the covering Aden Flint could only divert the ball into the roof of the net to ensure that our run of games without a win over Reading in all competitions stretches to eleven.
Mick McCarthy said he was “raging” after the match because of his teams’ habit of conceding just before half time and full time, but you have to wonder whether, in terms of the goals after the ninety minute mark at least, this may have something to do with the fact that our opponents tend to have five pairs of fresh legs on the pitch to our two – we switched off for their goal and Ng, although beaten too easily, was given no support, we defended the situation like a tired side.
Finally, an observation that, as we get progressively less subtle in our football, does the same apply to our fouling? If I could typify our record when it comes to fouling in most of our recent Championship seasons, the stats said we tended to give away more free kicks than most, but that did not translate itself into yellow and red cards, because we’d be among the best behaved sides in terms of cards. Is it me or do we regularly end up with three or more yellow cards in our games and we’ve definitely had more reds than normal this season – the three we had today all seemed clear yellows to me and how Vaulks wasn’t booked I’ll never know – we now foul in a way that leaves officials with no alternative but to issue a card, whereas, for example, under Neil Warnock, we made sure we stopped the opponent, but in a way that would often see the ref giving the offender a final warning.
I am sorry bit I cannot agree with your view that we were an improvement.
Why? Because we didn’t concede 5. On the balance of play we could have.
MM is not the answer.
Why not get Williams on the pitch.
Osei-tutu on at full back.
Sang to midfield
Colwill or Harris on.
Along with the 2 made that’s 5
If mick hasn’t got the courage to attempt to change the game when there is nothing to play for God help us next season.
The board need to speak to the fans. We are fed up and bored with the same old rubbish. I know of 4 who are not renewing next season. Perhaps home games could be played at leckwith stadium as crowds will be so small. That’s where the standard of football deserves to be.
I stand by my thoughts MM needs to go.
As you state Vaulks and Pack partnership is not working yet he sticks with it.
Ralls was brought in. Why?
In place of Vaulks I could understand but not in addition too.
MM tells the opponents before the game we are a kick and rush team and I hope it works. Or i hope we can catch you on the break. With players with no pace.
As a team, as a club, there is no vision. No ambition and no idea of how to get out of this decade long rut. They continuously employ boring managers who only know this type of football.
In my opinion. Which counts for nothing. Get rid of pack. Vaulks. Bacuna. Nelson. Brown. Flint. Murphy. Smithies.
Get in ball playing centre backs . Midfielders who are comfortable with the ball. A consistent wideman.
The problem there is that because of contracts we cannot do that. So the one or two changes will be dragged down to our present standard.
We were fortunate to get promotion with Warnock but along with that ride came the destruction of Cardiff city by paying over inflated prices and wages for average players who we are now stuck with.
Again, thank-you, Paul for your considered remarks on our latest game. You brought up some interesting points which I’ll return to later.
City’s 3421 more than matched Reading’s 4231 for much of the game. Ralls and Wilson played behind Moore and in front of the middle four. Whether Reading’s first half showing was a bit of a rabbit in the headlights job or due to the impressive closing down by City which prevented the hosts playing with a degree of fluency, who knows. What was certain was that this opening 45 mins was like City’s early matches with Mick MCarthy at the helm. This was a controlled performance but one where our one shot on target was scant reward. Reading came out the blocks as an all together different proposition after half-time. They were more purposeful, and despite having 3 shots on target, City managed four. I suppose a neutral would have said 1-1 was a fair result on the balance of play. However, what this City fan bemoans, is that after scoring in the 87th min to lead 0-1, and that this was the second match in succession where a winning lead was surrendered in the last minute of added time, was nothing short of criminal. That said, I would think most City fans would have been happy with a 1-1 scoreline before the start. Moore’s penalty was well struck, with power, giving the Reading keeper no chance, sending him the wrong way into the bargain.
Paul, you mention MM’s boring predictability. Yes, that strikes a chord with me. I read his comments after the game in that he felt Ralls deserved to be included in the starting line-up. That he did. With Pack there in his place we are far more studied (slower, if you like) when the midfield have the ball in our defensive third. I’ll be honest on this one. Any manager who thinks Ralls and/or Bacuna are suitable for the #10 Tomlin/Wilson slot has lost it. Not only will neither ever have the attacking craft for that role but, in Ralls’ case, to take him away from the place in which he is invaluable for City, in centre midfield, is daft. We can’t do without his energy there. In the last three games of the season I would love to see a Ralls/Sang central midfield with Wilson in front of them at #10. Osei-Tutu (right) and Murphy (left) would make up the midfield four in a 4411/442. However, now I’m reading McCarthy thinks that Sang’s position is full back/right wing back and not central midfield. Another: “Argh!” Twenty minutes of Murphy showed us that the home team were there for the taking had we been bolder in our choice of I-XI.
My second point, following on from your post, is the vexed question of referees and cards. A cursory look at the bookings’ count yesterday (0-3 to City) is only half of the issue. Reading had committed virtually the same number of fouls as City (16-17) yet no bookings at all. Even this must be viewed in the light of the worst challenge of the game. In the 6th min, when the Reading #17, in a studs up tackle, dived in and went right through Ng at ankle height, he had lost control, both feet were off the ground yet remarkably no red, not even a yellow card was given. Having watched the challenge again [CCFC full highlights after 6 mins of play] there can be no doubt that this was an awful tackle: a straight red without any doubt. There was no debate to it. The issue was compounded when the Reading player wasn’t even spoken to for the challenge that could have broken Ng’s leg. Sorry, but refs that let this sort of thing go unpunished have no credibility in my mind. Reading should have been down to 10 players from that point on. Furthermore, the Reading #14 moaned over every decision that didn’t go his way, even at one point waving an imaginary card in the direction of the ref to get a City player booked. And this referee books only City players, three of them. Paul, to look carefully at the Championship card situation this season it is interesting. That only 3 teams have more bookings than City and only 7 clubs with more dismissals paints us as a bunch of kickers, a cross between the Crazy Gang Wimbledon and Leeds (under Revie). I’ve lost count of the number of times City players have been booked this season by pedantic referees and for first offences when far more serious issues committed by the opposition are not punished, even the same players being let off repeated misdemeanors. Is it too much to ask for a level playing field?
So its four games to go. Will we ever get to see Sang in centre midfield?
Steve Perry.
I have to agree with you 100%. Those bookings were not all justified. One was when no contact was made. Yet that tackle in the 6th minute was studs up and out of control. Yet no yellow. It was only the fact that ng was quick enough to get out of the way that stopped him getting kicked.
I used to love reading these articles but I am now finding them boring. Just media sit on the fence type.
That ref was shocking. Yet you portray him as reasonably and fair.. Ralls tackles on half way. Gets pulled back so cannot break away. Yet foul goes against Ralls.
Come on Paul stop playing the pr game and say it how it is.
hi whilst i disagree with PR over his comments on MM as i will not castigate any manager until they have had the chance to shape the team the way they would like By this i dont mean just transfers but the fact that scince he has been appointed in this condensed season it has been non-stop tuesday -saturday the only break he was without several players due to international calls . i do however agree wholeheartedly about the refereeing this season and while i do not usually subscribe to conpiracy theories i do feel that city have suffered from referees having preconcieved ideas about us and we have been on the wrong side of decisions far too often to be coincidence . i also understand why the youngsters are not being blooded as any game that has anything riding on it for either side should not be used for this purpose i know that i would feel agrieved if teams fielded weakened teams against our rivals also it was interesting to see WALES ON LINES figures on our lack of away success when not wearing our blue strip this season
Thanks for your replies, it seems no one agrees with my comment about the way we commit fouls this season, but I would say all of you appear to think that what I said was me wanting to defend referees – you’ve all got the wrong end of the stick there. Ever since the latter days of Dave Jones’ time with us, I’ve noticed a trend whereby we’d be closer to the top of any table of fouls committed which was not reflected in the number of yellow or red cards we had because we tended to be closer to the bottom of such tables rather than the top. Over this season though, that has changed – we still give away a lot of free kicks, but now we’re getting more cards.
I suppose what I’m saying is that we’re not as streetwise as we once were. Look at someone like Lee Peltier who was a very physical player who would pick up his share of cards, but very rarely missed games through suspension – he’d let his opponent know he was around, but not do it in such a blatant way that the ref felt obliged to show him a card. We appear to have lost that knack – using Friday as an example, I thought Brown was a little unlucky to be booked, but Nelson and Pack could have no complaints, while I still don’t understand why Vaulks didn’t get a yellow card.
Does all of this mean I thought the ref had a good game on Friday? No, it certainly doesn’t – I thought he was poor against Swansea when his refusal to show a red card to Bennett was beyond belief and I thought he was poor on Friday. I agree about Yiadom’s bad foul on Ng which I’m guessing Mr Brooks ignored on the grounds that it was still early in the game – that should have no bearing on his decision and it should have been a yellow card at the very, very least. Pr accuses me of playing some pr game when the truth is that I just don’t subscribe to anti Cardiff or Welsh refereeing conspiracy theories. I believe that, by and large, the refereeing this season has been sub standard, but I believe that this is because the officials are poor full stop, not that they are good, but purposely anti Cardiff/Wales and I remain convinced that if we all supported an English club, we’d still be knocking them for their ineptitude.
I also cannot agree with Pr about sacking Mick McCarthy. As of today, our manager’s record reads P 18 W 8 D 7 L 3 – the only way a manager gets the sack with a record like that is if there has been laws of the land broken, some sort of scandal involving them, a serious breach of club rules or a breakdown in the relationship between the manager and the Board/owner.
So, I’m more or less talking entirely about off field reasons there. I share many of Pr’s reservations about the style of football we’re seeing under McCarthy, but I’ve got to agree with Richard about him being given at least one transfer window to make the squad more his own – I’m not convinced, he will start the work needed to make us more like a team I could enjoy watching, but I don’t think those doubts are a justification for sacking him and I’m virtually certain that Messrs Tan, Choo and Dalman feel the same way.
I take issue with Richard somewhat on the question of playing youngsters though. While agreeing that we shouldn’t field half a team of debut makers in one go, I think Richard’s use of the term “weakened team” is telling, because, having spent the last few months watching our under 23 side play, and generally be successful, while using a completely different style to the senior side, I’m not convinced we’d be weakened.
While I accept that there is a risk involved in blooding any youngster because they may find the whole experience too much for them, I’ll use Sam Bowen as an example of what I mean. If he were to start a game and show himself to be pretty capable of knitting together play for the seniors in the same way he does for the under 23s, then he would be strengthening them, rather than weakening them, because we do not have a player in the senior squad currently capable of playing in the manner that Bowen does for the age group side.
OK maybe my wording was wrong What i meant to say is that if we play youngsters in a game that still has something riding on it and we lose that there could be a percieved weakening of the team
Fair enough Richard, anyway, with Wycombe winning in midweek and so still having something to play for, I think any introduction of youngsters is likely to be put off for at least one more week.