In my piece on yesterday’s Academy match, I dedicated a few paragraphs to how badly things had gone for the first team in the afternoon’s Premier League programme with wins all of the way for the sides in danger of occupying the third relegation place instead of us – only the fact that Southampton’s victims were Brighton offered us any small consolation.
My take was that, even if our next two games (against Chelsea and Manchester City) resulted in the expected defeats, we needed to ruffle the feathers of at least one of those big teams to carry some confidence into the matches that would really decide our fate (e.g. Burnley, Brighton and Fulham) to keep our hopes intact.
Well, today we certainly did ruffle Chelsea’s feathers as, for the fourth time in four Premier League matches with them, we scored the first goal and yet we still find ourselves awaiting our first point against them. Whereas we could have no complaints about the two 4-1 defeats we’ve suffered at Stamford Bridge and the 2-1 scoreline at Cardiff City Stadium on the final day of the 13/14 campaign did not reflect the Londoner’s superiority, today’s 2-1 loss feels like a kick in the teeth – we got the performance needed from the team, but it’s hard to see how they can carry much in the way of optimism into future games when inept decision making by match officials can influence outcomes to the extent that we saw today.
Once again, there was evidence of the fact that whether consciously or unconsciously, Premier League “minnows” like us find that their already sizable task when it comes to staying up is made harder by the way the Premier League’s biggest clubs are favoured when it comes to the most important decisions in games.
To a degree of course, struggling sides are always more likely to suffer at the hands of officials than the better ones are because the greater control they play with means that they are not pressured into fouling or breaking the rules in the way that strugglers do, but, even allowing for that, after more than a quarter of a century of watching on television how Premier League matches are refereed and a couple of seasons of seeing my team play in the flesh at this level, I’ve seen enough to say that the charge that the bigger clubs get decisions in their favour that the smaller fry don’t tend to is a justified one.
The signs that Craig Pawson and his linesmen were doing us few favours were there in the first three quarters of today’s match, but they didn’t really have too much of an influence on proceedings as City, with an intelligent tactical display backed up by total commitment and a bit more ability than they are often given credit for, were getting me thinking “we can win this”.
Chelsea had most of the possession during the first half, but there was no dynamism to their game and it soon became clear that they were experiencing one of those awkward away days that have become familiar to them in 2019. With Eden Hazard and N’Golo Kante on the bench, the London side were missing arguably their two best players, but there was still enough star quality in their side to expect more of a goal threat from them – instead, all we got was slow passing and wayward shooting with only one effort from Pedro which fizzed not too far over causing any real alarm for a disciplined and dominant home defence.
Up the other end, City, with Josh Murphy giving an uncomfortable looking Marcos Alonso a torrid time of it on our right wing, were doing enough to suggest to fans that this could be the day when we would avoid defeat by a member of the top six for the first time this season and in the opening minute of the second half a win that would have totally transformed the outlook for the club looked possible as Victor Camarasa scored his second best goal for the club so far (the matchwinner at Leicester being his best) as he volleyed in a pass from Harry Arter from fifteen yards out with an almost delicate touch.
It was a lovely goal and it soon prompted the introduction of Hazard. I had been pretty confident that the Chelsea side which started the game did not have a goal in them, but from the moment Hazard came on, he brought a directness, poise and vision which made his team more of a challenge for City.
Nevertheless, with a lead to hold on to, City were still resolute and pretty composed in their defending and with a little bit more accuracy in their passing may just have been able to take full advantage of one of the counter attacking opportunities which came their way.
Holding onto their lead was going to be that much tougher with Hazard involved, but with most of the Belgian’s team mates still playing in a subdued manner and showing a strange inability to get their shots away cleanly, there were definite signs that City might just be able to record a win which would lift the gloom that had settled over supporters yesterday.
Sadly, it was at the time when some of the Chelsea fans in the ground were more intent on calling for Maurizio Sarri’s sacking than getting behind their players, that the officials became more of an influence on proceedings and there was little or nothing that they did in the closing stages that the City team or their supporters could thank them for.
When Lee Peltier followed Hazard infield and towards the Chelsea goal on a couple of occasions, he was penalized by referee Craig Pawson for fouls, but I couldn’t help thinking that the free kick awards were for who was, allegedly, being fouled rather than a judgment on the severity of Peltier’s challenges – would those free kicks have been awarded if someone other than Hazard had been the “victim”? Somehow, I doubt it.
They weren’t decisions that caused City major problems because they were both committed well inside the Chelsea half, but with Harry Arter and Aron Gunnarsson increasingly showing signs that the prodigious amount of running and covering they had put in was beginning to catch up on them, the last thing City needed was for the officials to start making their task more difficult.
With Chelsea’s other two subs Rubin Loftus-Cheek and Olivier Giroud both being an improvement on the players they replaced and Hazard beginning to enjoy more success in his attempts to create something other than long range shooting opportunities for his team mates, Chelsea were looking as dangerous as at any time on the game, but there were only six minutes left for City to hold on as they scrambled the ball out for a corner after what was maybe Chelsea’s best move of the game so far.
They had been under the cosh for a lot of the time, but there was a belief and together ness about City which suggested to me that they could hold on and that was why I was so disappointed with them when Chelsea equalised from the resultant corner as an unmarked Alonso glanced on at the near post and captain Cesar Azpicilueta nodded in a rare goal from close range on the far stick.
My anger came entirely from the fact that, having defended so well, City had, not for the first time this season, conceded a cheap goal from a set piece -sat at the other end of the pitch, I only saw two unmarked attackers getting their heads to the ball from a corner.
To lose the win just at the stage where you had virtually convinced yourself that it could happen was tough, but a draw would still have been have been a very satisfactory outcome. only City weren’t thinking like that. The possibility that they could do a Southampton where they snatched a winner after being pulled back level very late on arrived as sub Kenneth Zohore burst on to a long ball and looked to have beaten visiting centre back Antonio Rüdiger only for the German international to bring him down as he bored down on goal.
At first Pawson looked like he was not going to give anything and that’s why I believe that what happened next was governed by the Fourth Official because, after a delay of what seemed around ten seconds or more he awarded a free kick and showed the defender a yellow card.
Having now seen the incident again on television, I think an argument could be made to say keeper Arrizabalaga might have got to the ball before Zohore, but it was a very close call and, on balance, I stick to my original view that a red card should have been shown.
At this stage, I was thinking that there was nothing wrong with Chelsea’s equalizer and so thought, correctly I believe, that it was the decision not to send off Rüdiger that was responsible for the storm of boos which greeted Mr Pawson at the final whistle.
After that incident and with Chelsea levelling things up so late on, there was, for me at least, a sense of inevitability about their winning goal when Loftus-Cheek got the better of Peltier to nod powerfully in from a Willian cross to secure an undeserved win for the visitors. Therefore, I was angry, but also had this thought that 1-0 up after 84 minutes to a 2-1 loss was the sort of turn around that relegation sides suffer as I turned my radio on to hear what the media had to say about the game.
For the first few seconds, the talk was of a dramatic and crucial Chelsea win and the analysis was on whether Rüdiger should have walked or not. It was only a short while later that the presenter said something about the Chelsea equalizer having also come from an obviously offside position of course that I learned for the first time about the really big officiating mistake of the game.
As I listened to the Liverpool v Spurs match as I drove home, the conversation frequently returned to the Cardiff v Chelsea game and how the home side had been robbed of a deserved victory by an outrageously poor call by a linesman.
Although I had still not seen the goal for a second time, in a sense there was no need for me to do so, because the words I heard for an hour or so after the final whistle had blown made it so obvious that this was no borderline decision that an official had got wrong, but there was still general sympathy shown towards them because it was such a tough decision to make – this was a major howler.
Even so, despite knowing what was to come, it was still a shock to see just how offside Azpicilueta was when I eventually saw a replay of the goal – he went from being yards offside when the corner was taken to being a foot and more offside by the time Alonso flicked it on! While it does need to be re-emphasised that it was poor defending by City to allow Alonso to get his head to the ball, you could almost argue that they were perfectly happy for him to do so because they knew it was such an obvious offside!
Apparently, the linesman’s excuse is that the corner taker, Willian, was blocking his view of the incident – sorry, but that is preposterous. Does Willian take corners in a completely different manner to everyone else which makes it impossible for the linesman close by to do the job that he is supposed to? Based on the seven corners he took today and every other one I’ve seen him take in the six years he has been playing in this country, the answer is an emphatic no!
The linesman *must have stood over thousands of corners being taken during his time in the game, so, sorry that excuse of yours just does not wash – you made a very basic error which would have looked bad on a parks pitch, to make such a terrible mistake in “the best league in the world” is disgraceful.
There are those on the messageboards tonight who are criticizing City for conceding a soft second goal, but I won’t be because, as I said earlier, there was an inevitability about it and I can’t help thinking that some of our players may have thought the same as well.
Before going on to explain what I mean, I should preface my remarks by saying that I thought Chelsea should have had a penalty from the first corner of the game when there was a clear shirt pull on a Chelsea player by Gunnarsson, but, if you are, say, Sean Morrison and you’ve played in yet another game where you have been fouled in the opposition penalty area on at least two occasions, can you blame him for thinking to himself here we go again after conceding a late equaliser from a clearly offside position and then seeing an opposing centreback stay on after committing a foul which should probably have been punished by a red card?
No doubt this group of players will lift themselves again for the three successive away matches we now face because that is what they have done for two seasons and more, but they must know that they will travel to the Etihad on Wednesday in particular and not see many, if any, of the big calls which could go either way be called in their favour – as I mentioned earlier, it goes on all of the time in the Premier League, but seldom can the favouristism towards the big boys have been as obvious as it was today.
Finally, I’d like to send my condolences to the family and friends of former City midfield player Barrie Hole who it was announced had passed away at the age of seventy six recently.
Swansea born Hole played over two hundred games in City’s midfield between 1959 and 1966 before signing for Blackburn for a fee of forty thousand pounds. After two years at Ewood Park, he moved on to Villa before ending his career at Swansea – he played thirty times for Wales.
To be honest, although I saw Hole play for us on many occasions, I was too young to appreciate what he brought to the team. That said, I can remember my father being a fan of his as he picked him out as one of the better footballers in a team that was generally struggling during the time I watched him play for City.
*Ive watched Match of the Day 2 since typing this and feel even more now that City were robbed by the officials. As for the linesman, Jermaine Jenas named him as Eddie Smart – good on him for doing so, because Mr Smart does not deserve the anonymity that many doing his job get after that howler.
Thanks again, Paul.
I know its only a game but the late goings-on in yesterday’s game upset me.
So gutting for the team – THEY DIDN’T DESERVE THAT!
Officiating in football games, at any level, isn’t easy but the cost of those mistakes yesterday could be astronomical for Cardiff.
Again feeling rather guilty about commenting on here when not going to the games and yesterday missed the first half because of Mother’s Day commitments (not my mother I must add). In fact the first action I saw was the cracker from Camarasa, about the only stroke of luck we’ve had all season was getting Cam on loan, and I thought we held our own against the Sarri-ballers and was beginning to think about another clean sheet. I have to say I missed the obvious offside but the assistant shouldn’t have. As I have said on here before, I think the offside law/rule makes it very difficult for the linesmen and in general they do a decent job but he should have got this one right.
The point you make about officials favouring the bigger clubs certainly appears to be the case at times, trouble is it sounds a bit like sour grapes and I would like to think that officiating mistakes even themselves out over a season.
Something has to be done about the wrestling that goes on at set-pieces, each week it seems to get worse and the referees are filing it in the “too difficult’ box. Morrison seemed particularly hard done by yesterday but I’m sure we are just as guilty at times.
Well what looked like a difficult task before the weekend looks an almighty mountain to climb now. Bloody Wolves were never going to do us a favour.
Paul, being a few years older than thee, I remember well Barry Hole at Ninian Park. When he made his debut because of his slight build he looked rather weak but he developed into a very decent mid-fielder with silky skills, an eye for a pass and contributed some important goals, I believe he got one in THAT Spurs game (3-2 on A Saturday evening. Rest in peace, Barry and commiserations to his family and friends.
Terrific report of such upsetting events, Paul, and, goodness, you’re such a fair man…an example to us all.
You’re right – great day for our tactics, commitment, intelligence, technique…not always present, as we all well know.
I think we can be very proud of the players and the Manager…but, it does look gloomy from here; at least we know we have it in us.
Eddie? Not so Smart!
Barry Hole – like Colin, I’m old enough to remember him well…RIP.
Good morning Paul and others – Thanks for your views as always, and I am fully in agreement with your comments.
The odds on a City victory just before kick-off were 7 – 1, and my step son, ever the optimist, placed a fiver on the Bluebirds to win. With seven minutes to go, it looked as though it was going to be a most wonderful afternoon, but……
I, like you, had not realised just how offside the Chelsea captain was when he ‘scored’ that goal. Returning to the lounge on level 4 after the final whistle, watching and listening to Souness rightly complaining about the ineptitude of the linesman was the first I knew of that situation. And the comments of the MOD team later on just reaffirmed the view as to just how wrong the officials were in allowing the ‘goal’. I genuinely believe that by allowing the goal to stand affected what transpired later on in added time. So we lost three points and Tony, my step-son the best part of £30.
As for the possible three penalties, two for us and one for Chelsea, I believe they all should have been given. I appreciate that decisions of this nature are subjective, but goodness me, they were not hard to miss. I have always, and still do, think that referees act honestly, but my belief has to be linked to a referee’s ability to position himself correctly in potential judgemental situations and I regret that yesterday Mr Pawson, and his cohorts, had a wretched day. And that also applied with the Zahore incident.
So we soldier on. Wednesday will be difficult but I just hope that we put in the same endeavour as we tackle the Sky Blues on their own turf and hope that this time the footballing Gods, and officials, will show us some compassion.
So VAR is being brought in for borderline decisions soon. None of those incidents yesterday (the 2 pens not given, the offside goal and red card not awarded) were. There was no doubt in any of them and VAR should not have been needed for such run of the mill decisions that are made many, many times a game. In fact Rudiger could have already been off the pitch for earlier misdemeanors before he blocked Zohore. The ref and linesman didn’t, ‘have a bad day,’ it was partiality in the extreme. There I’ve said it. But it had to be said for to say nothing would be to condone it: silence, after all, is consent.
How many times this season have we not been given glaringly obvious decisions? The non penalty against Watford was bad but today’s four incidents were outrageous. Either the officials were blind, they didn’t know the Laws of the Game or they were partial. How come all the bad decisions went one way? In all three cases they should be debarred from taking part in another game.
There are words to describe today’s officials that I will choose not to write. It would get me into trouble. It was farcical. It was surreal. Even the Match of the Day pundits and Graeme Souness off (Sky) did not mince their words and roundly criticised the officials.
Today we were cheated out of a game we looked to be winning. In fact going into the last 5 minutes we should have been 3-0 up and possibly against 10 men. Perhaps such an unexpected 3 points would have put us a little too close for comfort to Burnley and possible safety for the PL elite to have to come to terms with.
This morning we should have been reflecting on fine City performance and a win that we deserved, but then entered Mr Pawson and the rest is, as they say, history.
StT.
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Thanks Paul and fellow Supporters for you input to yesterday’s game. I missed the game just returned from a week’s holiday in Madeira.
I was checking my phone 1-0 up fantastic. Ten minutes to go will we hold on switch phone off, 20 mins later we had lost 1-2.
Then read the reports and watched the match on MOTD 2. Could not believe it. It was good to hear the commentator and pundits stating how unfairly we were treated by the Officials. Tell me what role does the 4th Official play in all this and can’t the Club make representation to the FA about the way the SO CALLED OFFICIALS handled this game and put our chances of staying in the prem, unlikely.
Barrie Hole great half back for Cardiff and Wales , saw him play many times. Met him once on a train in Crewe station, he was joining Blackburn then. Got his autograph too.(now gone)
I used to live and work in Swansea and new him from the Newsagents shop he ran in Brynmill. Always had time for a chat, did’nt miss football preferred to play golf instead.
RIP.
Hello everyone,
Highly annoying yesterday. It even made the German sports news with the pundits here saying that the ref and his team „must have suffered a black-out….ninety minutes long“
This comment was then followed by conspiracy thoughts like „Maybe if it does come to an european super league the top premier league clubs will be able to decide which refs they want to take wih them?“
Anyway I would just like to mention something that Paul got off his chest in the last quiz post. The premier league in general. I quite agree with his comments.
Despite being in the EPL I have rarely been so bored with a season of football. There seems to be an eternity between games and I have just realized that, despite being an avid reader of the blog, this is my first comment of the current season. So apologies for that but I just could not get excited enough to write. However yesterday and the West Ham game woke me up a bit.
And RIP Barrie Hole. I have a small story about him.
Cardiff City Christmas party 1962.
Barrie drove from Swansea and picked up my dad (then player Tony Pickrell) and his girlfriend (my mum) in Neath. Barrie then drove like a madman to Cardiff where a great time was had by all. Barrie then drove like a madman back to Neath. As my mum and dad (both shaking like leaves and pale in the face) climbed trembling but thankful out of Barrie’s car my dad asked „Barrie…how the hell did you ever pass your driving test?”
Barrie answered.. „I didn’t!“
Thanks for the write up Paul.
I’ve always presumed ‘cock up’ rather than conspiracy when poor decisions are made in football matches but yesterday stretched that theory to the limit. If it really was just incompetence then those officials shouldn’t be in charge of a professional football match ever again. They probably will though, and I certainly can’t shake off a sense that this was bias coming in to play.
It was however a kind of moral victory (nil points for those I know) and I do feel that in our last two games we have shown that, maybe late in the day, we have finally discovered a formation and style that could bring some success at this level. If we could maintain this in the more winnable of the fixtures to come then our chances of survival may not be totally extinguished yet.
RIP to Barrie Hole – arguably our best player during my first six years as a City fan. I was always a bit surprised he joined another second-tier team when transferred to Blackburn in the summer of 1966 and his career did seem to begin a downward turn after that point.
Finally, are your write ups always going to be in the form of a poem from now on ? I particularly enjoyed verse seven.
According to T S Eliot, “April is the cruellest month.” I hope, more than hope – – pray — that Cardiff will somehow cling on to the Premiership, and if my prayers remain unanswered, I fall back on the pious wish that we can bounce back from the Championship next season.
Very early in last September I wrote that Camarasa would turn out be the best signing that Cardiff have made this season. There was talk during the recent window. I think, that feelers had been put out to make his loan move permanent but a transfer failed to transpire. What a golden opportunity went awry! I cannot see him staying with Cardiff if we are relegated, and even if we stay up I’m pretty sure that Real Betis would accept offers from other Premiership clubs for his services, and that Camarasa would be compelled or successfully encouraged to move on, even though I’ve been told his wife went to college in Cardiff.
I don’t want to comment on the refereeing decisions from Sunday’s game. In the old cliché, it’s no good crying over spilt milk. Now, it’s a case of “Onwards and Upwards, ! Arriba, Arriba !” Ever the optimist, I’m looking for a miracle tomorrow. Even though common sense tells me it’s virtually impossible. miracles sometimes do happen, so I’m told.
Also how sad to read of the death of Barrie Hole, an excellent wing-half. I remember in a pre-season training session when Tony Pickrell made a joke by calling for a pass from Barrie Hole by shouting out, “Through the hole, Hole!” Everyone laughed, and it seemed to sum a sense of team camaraderie which made professional football in those days so fair-minded in comparison with what is now the case.
Thanks everyone for your messages about a game which still gets me angry now when I think about it!
Colin, I do have some sympathy for those who run the line because the modern day offside law is a much harder one to adjudicate than the one we all grew up with. However we are talking about a so called elite official here – Neil Warnock was right in my opinion in his press conference yesterday when he said that officials at Premier League level with all of the training and education they get should be good enough to come up with a way to ensure that linesmen/women find a way to make sure they make a right decision if a corner taker could be blocking their view. As I have said on a few occasions since Sunday, we would see the sort of wrong decision which occurred on Sunday being repeated fairly often if players blocking the view of officials after they have taken a corner was a serious issue – the fact that we don’t says to me that most of the Premier League’s elite officials find the way to cope that I alluded to above, Eddie Smart didn’t on Sunday and it might be that City get relegated as a result.
Yes, Lindsay, speaking as someone who had been critical of the way we had gone about games with top six clubs in the past, I was proud of the Neil Warnock and his players on Sunday.
You’re right BJA, that equaliser gets disallowed and a combination of the boost it would have given us and the further sinking into the crisis mode Chelsea have got themselves into over the past few months could well have been enough for us to see the game out – it was only Hazard who was concerning me before Chelsea scored. By the way, is your step son going to have a fiver on us at 40/1 (at least!) tonight?
Steve, I’ve got to come down on Richard’s side when it comes to cock up v conspiracy, but when you watch the highlights back on Match of the Day and listen to what Jermaine Jenas, who always strikes me as pretty fair, in particular had to say then I think it has to be accepted that there was much more to be addressed here than the usual sour grapes you get from managers and supporters of beaten teams. We got lucky with one decision all day long, whereas Chelsea had four huge ones go in their favour and I think it can be justifiably argued that the officials got all of them wrong. I’ve also watched the extended highlights of the game on the club website now and so was reminded of, for example, that handball by Hazard that the ref missed which meant that Harry Arter was booked for the ninth time this season (a further yellow card tonight would see him suspended for the Burnley and Brighton games) and the number of times Sean Morrison was fouled by defenders when contesting high balls outside the Chelsea penalty area.
Geoff, as I mentioned in my blog piece, I’m convinced that the fourth official (think it was Andre Marriner) relayed the decision about the Rudiger/Zohore incident to Craig Pawson who, in effect, was just doing what he was told in that incident, because there was no sign of him giving a free kick at first -I’m not trying to excuse Mr Pawson there because I don’t understand why he would have needed help with that situation.
Adrian, it’s very good to hear from you again and I hope you and your family are well – just to repeat my view that while I want us to stay up because it would be a fantastic achievement by everyone associated with the club if we did, the blow of relegation would be softened because I believe we would be heading back to a better and more enjoyable league than the one we are in. Nice story about Barrie Hole by the way.
Richard, I just want tonight’s game out of the way and see it as a damage limitation exercise, but I share some of that slight optimism I sense from your message – if we play like we did against West Ham and Chelsea in the two matches which follow tonight’s then I definitely feel we can get six points. As for my poetry, it’s a software error by WordPress (the company I use for the foundations of the blog so to speak) which I’ve noticed happening on isolated occasions in the past – it’s a bugger because it’s fiddly and time consuming to put right.
Anthony, you told me you had noticed the story linking Camarasa with Spurs, Leicester and West Ham yesterday and, even if they aren’t true I think it’s inevitable that there will be other, bigger, clubs in for him this summer – I’d say the odds are against him being here next season even if we do stay up, although, as you say, the fact that his partner (I don’t believe they are married yet) knows and likes Cardiff could give us a chance I suppose. To be fair to the club, I’m not certain that, firstly, we could have afforded to sign Sala and Camarasa in January and, secondly, rather like Harry Arter, that the player would have been willing to commit to us then with our future in the Premier League so uncertain. Also, thanks for another nice story about Barrie Hole.
Thanks for such a comprehensive reply, Paul.