Seven decades of Cardiff City v Ipswich Town matches.

Posted on September 1, 2023 by The other Bob Wilson

There’s never ever been more football info around than there is currently, but, it’s funny, the more TV channels there are out there, the less television I watch, and, on a similar theme, I’m far less well up with what’s going on at other football clubs despite all the websites, You Tube Vlogs and blogs like this one there are around covering every side City come up against.

Part of this, is down to me and the aging process I guess. For example, I have every copy of what I still call the Rothmans Football Yearbook since the first one covering the 1969/70 season. Time was, it felt like I would read the book from cover to cover, but, as my three score years and ten gets too close for comfort, I’ve barely opened the current edition which arrived about a fortnight ago. These days, I use the Yearbook very much as a reference aid (I suppose this was always meant to be its function among normal people!) and my yellow Wisdens, going back to 1972, have undergone the same transition. My excuse when I wonder why I don’t read books anywhere near as much as I used to is that I don’t have the time any more, which, when you think that I’ve been “retired” since 2009 is ludicrous really.

All of the above is the preamble for me saying that one of the mysteries of all the pre season punditry telling us how the Championship table would look come the end of the season was how high they had Ipswich Town finishing (a few picked them for a top two finish) compared to how low the Plymouth Argyle team which pipped them for the League One title last season were tipped to finish.

I think their manager Keiran McKenna is a major reason why Ipswich are predicted to do so well and the fact that their side had a lot less reliance on loan players last season than Plymouth’s did has something to do with why Ipswich are fancied for the top six and Argyle for the bottom half a dozen. Certainly, the start the two teams have made, so far anyway, suggests that the pundits had it right regarding the merits of the two sides.

I can remember watching Plymouth beat Ipswich 2-1 early last season in what I reckoned was one of the best League One games I’d seen in recent years – I can recall thinking that they both would have beaten the City side of the time pretty comfortably, Ipswich were also impressive in winning at Sunderland in their opening game of this season and I think we’ll definitely go there as underdogs tomorrow. After all, the best thing about our win over Sheffield Wednesday was the result – the performance wasn’t too hot. By contrast, we were very good in winning at Birmingham on Tuesday, but how many of that side will start tomorrow – I’ll be surprised if it’s more than three.

Anyway, it’s good to see Ipswich back at this level, no way they are a third tier club in reality and it looks like it’ll be some time before they return there. The very tough start to our away programme definitely continues tomorrow and I’d be delighted, and a little surprised, if we can come back with a point.

Here’s the usual seven questions on upcoming opponents with the answers to be posted on Sunday morning.

60s. Odd how your mind can play tricks on you, I associate this midfielder with one of the most distinctive kits in the British game, yet he spent far more time wearing the plain blue and white of Ipswich (kudos to them as well for resisting the temptation to change their shorts colour to blue unlike some I can mention!). He started off in another country wearing yellow and red for little nomads, before signing for a club that had gone by the name “The Bank of England” during much of the previous decade, but, after not playing a single league game for them in two years, Ipswich signed him and got six years out of him during which he was a regular member of a promotion team and the one which stabilised Ipswich’s position back in Division One. As the decade came to a close, he stayed in blue and white, but wore the colours in a different style before a move to that club’s biggest rivals. There was then a move back to his second club where this time he played six league games for them. Next up was a season in Apartheid South Africa and a loan move to play in yellow and red again to end his career in full time football. He won seven caps for a country he wasn’t born in and, surprisingly, the first of them didn’t arrive until he was on the point of leaving Ipswich, who am I describing.

70s. Another player with one of those surnames that I’ve only heard in football (and then only the once). A defender, he moved a long way from home to join Ipswich and was rewarded with a debut at Anfield at the age of just seventeen. He made it to fifty appearances for the Portman Road club before he and a colleague were part of a transfer deal which saw a future England international joining Ipswich. I did read a messageboard post saying that the two makeweights in the deal were their club’s worst ever signings, that’s harsh on our man who, having already suffered a concerning head injury while with Ipswich, then went through another one at this new club and was forced to retire from the game at the age of twenty two. Following football, he returned to Suffolk and became a policeman, but who is he?

80s. An Artificial Intelligence stink from the 80s maybe! (3,6)

90s. Curse an old coin perhaps.

00s. Who was the Ipswich player who retired from football at the age of 22 during this decade to pursue a career in Gaelic Football, only to make a comeback in his native land some seven years later – winning a Player of the Year award for the Gypsies in the process.

10s. He led the Ipswich attack in a game at Cardiff City Stadium during this decade, upset the local council by making derogatory comments about Ipswich town centre shortly after signing for the Portman Road club and will be found doing media work from places like the RAW Charging Stadium, Meadowbank and Grosvenor Vale this season, who is he?

20s. Religious member of family who used to take ages to go to sleep?

Answers.

60s. Danny Hegan was born in Scotland, but played his international football for Northern Ireland and he began his career with Albion Rovers (the Wee Rovers) before signing for Sunderland who he left in 1963 without playing a game for them. Hegan then clocked up over two hundred games for Ipswich until a move to West Brom in 1969 and then he spent the first few years of the seventies with Wolves before another short stay at Sunderland (this time he played six times for them). Highlands Park in South Africa was his next port of call before a loan move to Partick Thistle to finish.

70s. Bishop Aukland born John Peddelty made his debut for Ipswich in a 2-1 defeat at Liverpool in 1972. He and team mate Terry Austin were part of the deal which took Paul Mariner from Plymouth Argyle to Ipswich in 1977, but after suffering the second serious head injury of his career quite soon after arriving at Home Park, Peddelty was advised to quit the game at 22.

80s. Ian Atkins.

90s. Adam Tanner.

00s. Shane Supple saved a penalty in the last game he played for Ipswich before the club agreed to cancel his contract because he had “fallen out of love” with the game. Supple returned seven years later to play for the Bohemians of Dublin (nicknamed the Gypsie’s).

10s. Aaron McLean was Ipswich’s centre forward in a 0-0 draw at Cardiff City Stadium in January 2013 during a loan spell from Hull City. McLean currently works as a summariser for what is now called TNT Sports in their coverage of the National League.

20s. Christian Walton, the Waltons was an American TV series from the seventies and eighties. I never saw a single episode of it, but knew all about their say goodnight to everyone ritual as acted out here.

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Bulut picks a team without centrebacks and Cardiff respond with their best Cup performance in years!

Posted on August 30, 2023 by The other Bob Wilson

This morning, I was pronouncing that Erol Bulut was very much a four at the back man and would not be changing to a three any time soon. It was a bit rich me pontificating like that about a manager I’d never heard of three months ago and I’m eating humble pie tonight as our manager proved me completely wrong by picking a side playing 3-5-2 some twelve hours later! 

Not only that, but he picked a team which you looked at and thought “where’s the defenders?”. Here’s the team Bulut selected;-  

Rúnarsson, Ng, Romeo, Rinomhota, Sawyers, Adams, Wintle, Colwill, Tanner, Etete, Grant. 

Getting a workable 3-5-2 out of that lot would have tested most supporters I would think, but not only did Erol Bulut manage it, he also produced one of the best Cardiff City Cup performances of the past decade as they returned from St Andrews with a 3-1 win over a Birmingham side which has taken ten points from their first four league games as well as winning at Cheltenham in the First Round – they had not been behind in a game all season.. 

City were “stylish” and bright, took the game to their opponents and were well worth their win, in fact it could have been a bigger victory. 

I should say here that the above description is based entirely on the commentary on the club website I listened to. All I’ve seen of the game are very brief highlights because it seems that unless your team is selected for coverage by Sky, you’re not going to be able to watch League Cup games live these days unless you’re at the ground.  

Radio coverage is very limited as well- Radio Wales has not covered our first two games in this season’s League Cup (all you could listen to tonight was the Newport v Brentford tie), so at a time when the phrase “wall to wall football”has never been more appropriate, it seems the League Cup is the exception which proves the rule. 

Therefore, I’m forming my views on tonight’s game based on what I heard from two club employees on the Cardiff City website and I think it’s fair to say that you’re talking about very biased reporting generally if you have to rely on club websites.. 

From what I’ve heard, our lot are better than most when it comes to possible bias (although one of the two tonight was not backward in coming forward when it came to showing his Cardiff allegiance!). The point is really that there has to be a possibility at least that City we’re nowhere near as good as they sounded tonight – it also needs to be recorded that Birmingham made six changes from their team that beat Plymouth last weekend. 

However, the match stats tended to back up what the commentators were saying. For a start, City had seventy one per cent possession (when do we ever have over seventy per cent possession and it was above eighty per cent at one time), we had thirteen goal attempts to nine with a six three lead in on target efforts, nine corners to three and a frustrated Birmingham side committed seventeen fouls to our six. 

Let’s not forget that if it was a much changed Birmingham side that was even more true of us with only Perry Ng surviving from Saturday’s starting line up against Sheffield Wednesday. 

We all know what tends to happen when we make ten changes for Cup games – we get embarrassed. Not this time though in a match which certainly sounded as if it was played with more urgency and intensity than supporters are used to seeing from us in early round Cup ties. 

Bulut was very pleased after the game saying that no one in his side had a poor game and that they had played without centrebacks. 

Our manager is right there, Ng has experience of playing,,and playing well, in a back three, but, him apart, there was no one else who could say it was his natural position. Alongside Ng was Mahlon Romeo, no surprise really when you look at what was available in that starting line up and, intriguingly, Ebou Adams who was in the middle of the three. 

One name stood out in the Birmingham team, Lukas Jutkiewicz. He may be at the veteran stage now, but I had visions of him making mincemeat out of our back three in the air in particular, but it never happened, quite the opposite in fact. 

With Tanner and Grant as a pair of very attack minded wing backs and a midfield three of Rinomhota, Wintle and Sawyers, with Colwill pushed forward to support Etete, plus a subs bench containing plenty of youngsters, it was certainly a bold looking selection and this was reflected in the start the team made. 

City had already almost opened Birmingham up when they took the lead in just three minutes with a lovely goal as the ball was switched from right to left by Wintle who fed Grant. The West Brom loanee apparently made his marker Marcel Oakley’s life a misery all night and here he went past him on the outside before picking out Colwill who finished beautifully as he let the ball run across him before beating ex City keeper Neil Etheridge from about twelve yards out. 

One thing Championship sides have not expected to experience in recent years is to be chasing around trying to get the ball off a Cardiff City team, but that’s certainly what it sounded like tonight.  

All Birmingham had to offer in reply was a free kick by Leandro Bacuna’s brother, Juninho that brought a great save by the debut making Alex Rúnarsson. 

City, notably, Kion Etete, had chances to put us two up and my worry at half time was that we’d not cashed in on what sounded like our clear superiority, 

Birmingham had enjoyed their best spell of the first half in its closing minutes and made a change at half time amid expectations that we’d face some fierce pressure in the early minutes after the break, but instead it was City who were again forcing the issue. 

It sounded like Colwill, Tanner and Grant were all having very good games while Etete was effective even if his finishing could be criticised, but equally there were plenty of times where it felt like the quality, game experience and real cutting edge wasn’t quite there for City as final balls were not quite precise enough to really open up the home defence.. 

Adams had attracted plaudits for his performance in his unfamiliar position and he could definitely be described as the winner in his dual with Jutkiewicz when he won possession with the striker claiming he’d been fouled. The angry Jutkiewicz then flew in with a challenge on Romeo who happened to be the first City man who had the ball when he got up and, by all accounts, was fully deserving of the red card which followed. Birmingham manager John Eustace thought differently and called the decision harsh, but, having now seen the incident, I can only say that I’m sure Mr Eustace would have been complaining if a City player had made such a tackle and had not been sent off.. 

City then came up with another classy goal as Tanner picked out Colwill with a cross that was back flicked into Wintle’s path by the Welsh international (who was described as a “man possessed” by the Wales Online reporter at the match and the captain on the night guided his twenty yard shot into the corner of Etheridge’s net. 

Sub Scott Hogan got the home team back into the game within two minutes as he nutmegged Rúnarsson as the striker got the wrong side of Adams, but City were safe when in the fourth of seven additional minutes, Etete scored from six yards from a cross by another sub Keiron Evans. 

Evans had replaced Grant on the hour, while Ike Ugbo was brought on for the last few minutes for the impressive Tanner. 

Besides that, Mark McGuinness was part of a double substitution for the last twenty minutes or so when he replaced Ng, but it was the other player brought on who epitomised City’s enterprising approach – Cian Ashford had got a token three minutes off the bench in the First Round tie with Colchester, but here he was trusted enough  by his manager to come on just a couple of minutes after Birmingham had scored to replace Wintle – I don’t expect the talented Ashford to be involved on Saturday at Ipswich, but, all of a sudden, Erol Bulut has selection issues of the best type and you have to think that there should be some sort of reward for a few of those involved tonight when it comes to Championship football on Saturday.

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