If you look at the league table, Cardiff City’s Under 23 Development team are having a very poor season, but, on the evidence of their 4-0 win over second placed Ipswich this afternoon, tables can lie!
The Warnock years saw a change of emphasis at this level with the club’s Academy products having to battle for their places against what seemed to be a never ending stream of trialists who, generally speaking, played a game or two, and then disappeared never to be heard of again.
The City developed players who were able to keep their places in what is the closest thing we have to a reserve team (for example, Cameron Coxe and Rhys Abbrruzzese, who both impressed while playing full back for Wales under 20s in the 2017 Toulon tournament), were forced to play in sides which, generally, featured four or five changes every week and they would also have to often play out of position to allow a trialist full back a chance that was barely ever taken, while two fine prospects as fifteen and sixteen year old’s saw their development as players interrupted.
If the Warnock approach could be seen to have worked, then it did so best in the case of Northern Ireland international Ciaron Brown who was signed from Wealdstone after a couple of trials and has been called back by City from a third loan spell in the Scottish Premier League with Livingston who he helped to a place in this season’s Scottish League Cup Final.
Brown’s ability to play on the left of a back three, like he did for Livingston, may be useful to the first team if Mick McCarthy persists with the three at the back system seen for the final period at Barnsley and from the start against Millwall. Brown can also play left back, so, even if he doesn’t make the starting eleven, he’d be a handy option on the bench for the senior team.
Dan Martin is a promising left back who also took the chance he was given by City and has impressed at Under 23 level as well, but it’s been a while since he played for us and so it could be he’s injured or has been told he is going to be released.
Brown and Martin apart though, the Warnock approach didn’t work and I would argue that at a club which struggles enough to get the best out of players in the 18 to 21 age group anyway, it set back the hopes of better players already with City who were not getting the experience they should have at an important time in their hoped for progression to the senior game.
Last summer saw one of City’s best young prospects, Sion Spence, turn down a contract offer by the club and opt to try his luck elsewhere. There were risks involved in doing that of course, but I think you can say it worked in Spence’s case – yesterday he scored a hat trick for the Crystal Palace Under 23 team he was captaining against Norwich with this superb volley notching his third goal.
City’s unwillingness or inability to bring through their own players for the best part of a decade was bound to lead to the sort of thing we saw with Spence in the end, but, probably more damaging, was the effect it must have started having on the parents of talented under tens in the Cardiff area who would have looked at the Cardiff Academy’s awful recent record and thought that they did not want their lad to sign up for the local team.
Perhaps people in positions of authority at the club finally cottoned on to what was happening, because this season, Mark Harris and Joel Bagan, originally with Southampton, have become the first City Academy graduates to play league football and be considered as genuine first team squad members, as opposed to the token Cup appearances that have been the norm in the past, since Declan John in 2013.
Significantly, the Under 23 team has become what it should be in my opinion and it is now the norm to see teams almost exclusively consisting of Academy members and graduates being fielded at this level.
As mentioned earlier, results have been poor and up until about December it looked certain that City would be a long way adrift at the bottom of the league come the end of the season, but things have started to pick up either side of Christmas culminating in today’s decisive victory, which did not flatter City in the slightest, which I would say was the most satisfying I’ve seen at this level in four or five years.
It’s great that, especially now, these games are streamed by the club even though they had a bit of an unfortunate time of it with their commentary today which was non existent to begin with, then sounded like they were in an echo chamber and ended the game by sounding as if they were under water.
However, during the bit in the middle when it worked properly, the word that was heard quite often about City was “maturity” and it was fully justified because this was not a bunch of talented kids on a day when things went well for them, this was a group of young professionals playing with style and skill, but also a determination, discipline and work ethic which squeezed the life out of their opponents.
City selected back up keeper Dillon Phillips for this game, he had a few awkward moments with some very good Ipswich dead ball deliveries from corners, one of which was headed against the crossbar from point blank range by centre back Armin and did well to foil Alexander and Curtis in virtual one on ones, but, generally speaking, he was well protected by a defence which had to be rearranged just before kick off.
Owen Pritchard (who has been impressive in midfield in recent games at this level and who played for the Academy team in their win at Watford on Saturday) moved into central defence from left back with James Waite (back from his loan at Weston Super Mare) filling in at full back and not showing the inability to take throw ins properly that was so obvious the last time I saw him play there! On the other flank, Tom Sang showed that we may not be quite as short of right back options as first thought and Jack Bodenham was a commanding captain who didn’t put a foot wrong.
Although I’ve been a bit off about the loan moves to Welsh non league sides that have been the norm at City for years, Sam Bowen seems to have benefited from his time at Barry. Apart from one misplaced first half pass which resulted in Phillips having to make his first good stop, there was the usual crisp use of the ball by the midfielder, but there was also a strength in the tackle and body strength that had not been noticeable before to his game.
In commentary, it was remarked that Bowen and Keenan Patten had been playing alongside each other for both club and country for about ten years and with the latter again demonstrating his good all round game which offers a nice contrast with the former’s sitting role, it may not be too fanciful to say something which would have been considered a complete non starter until recently – they may also get to play alongside each other in our first team.
On the flanks, Keiron Evans scored a lovely goal and, in the first half in particular, caused a lot of problems to the right of Ipswich’s defence, while on the right, Rubin Colwill continued his recent improvement with two assists and he really should have scored with a header to end a sweeping City counter attack, but was foiled by one of a number of good saves made by the visitors’ best player – goalkeeper Bert White.
Mark Harris was probably the second most experienced player in the team behind Phillips and, operating behind the main striker, he had a pretty quiet time of it in the first half, but came into things more after that as Ipswich tired – he was another one who probably should have scored only to be foiled by White.
There were two goals for Isaak Davies who was a constant nuisance to the Ipswich defence with his movement, pace and surprising strength – rather like Harris, he was seen to best effect as the game stretched, opponents tired and counter attacking opportunities presented themselves.
City scored twice quite early on and then twice in the dying minutes. The first arrived after ten minutes when Colwill came in from the right to a centre forward position and then played a short pass to Evans who took a touch then shot high into the net from twenty yards. Ten minutes later, Colwill was the provider again with a lovely run down the right past a couple of opponents before crossing towards the near post where Davies got in front of his man to touch the ball in from six yards, perhaps with the aid of a deflection.
On eighty three minutes, City ended any slight, lingering Ipswich hope with a counter attack which Davies finished impressively by stepping inside and firing in from the edge of the penalty area. Three minutes later, Davies got clear of the last defender, but was denied the hat trick he deserved by another good Wright save, only for the keeper to be unlucky to see the ball break to sub Roland Idowu who was left with a tap in to complete the scoring.
So many of the side today were in what was, arguably, City’s best ever Academy team which won their league a couple of years ago and, in a way, they are a little lucky because it finally appears that attitudes are changing at the club. Whereas in years past, the Under 23 team was a place where players stagnated and then were released, now, thanks in part to the change of rules to allow more substitutes in first team matches, we have a side where the likes of Patten, Evans, Davies and Colwill have been shown that playing for City in the Championship is only a call up off the bench away – they are more confident because of it and their team mates today are going to be thinking “that could be me”.
