It’s funny, the Internet and the likes of You Tube have spawned an explosion of footballing information which would enable anyone with the free time to read a small percentage of what is out there and become so knowledgeable about the game, yet, at the same time the good old league table has tended to suffer no end of cutbacks in the way it is presented to readers of on line writings on football..
To explain what I mean, you go online now to probably more than ninety per cent of football websites and it seems as if a battle is being waged to see who can produce league tables with the smallest amount of information in them. For example, it’s common now to see tables presented which just show the number of games each team has played and how many points they have. Okay, I have no problem with admitting that I’m a football nerd (actually I’m a nerd full stop!), but surely, I can’t be the only one who longs for a return to the sort of league tables of my youth that I used to read in the papers every Sunday morning?
Such tables are still around, but they can take some finding – this is the one I use from what is a superb statistical site which carries the most comprehensive breakdown of information on the Championship I know of.(click on the “wide” version of the ;league table to see what I mean)
I’d be amazed if you’ve reached this far without asking “what on earth is he blathering on about?”, well, it’s all part of a pretty convoluted way of working Cardiff City’s home record into the conversation.
In recent months, I’ve taken to watching three or four streaming sites in which the presenters give their predictions as to what the scores are going to be in the upcoming round of Championship fixtures and I tell you what, I wish I had a pound for every time I’ve heard someone on them say Cardiff have a good home record this season.
It’s as if the people concerned looked at the table I posted a link to earlier in late October after we beat the wurzels and have been using those hugely condensed tables I referred to at the start, which tell you almost nothing, ever since!
Even before a ball had been kicked in the Championship this season, you only needed to look at our fixtures to realise that we were paired against all of the teams predicted to go down in our first few home games – QPR, Sheffield Wednesday and Rotherham all came to Cardiff City Stadium before September was out as did a Swansea team without a win and struggling under a mad managerial appointment at the time. Coventry were out of form when they visited us a few days after our derby win and Watford hadn’t won in a few when they came here shortly afterwards.
Throw in the good win over the wurzels and, yes, we were a force at home in the early part of the season – sixteen points out of a possible twenty one offered the proof of that.
However, what’s happened since then has undone all of the earlier good work. We took advantage of all of those early games against weak opposition, but any hopes this would give us the confidence to carry on our form through the tougher visitors to follow have come to nought.
The next seven home fixtures have produced a complete reversal of the first seven with one win, one draw and five defeats and the odds now have to be on City going through a fourth successive season where home defeats outnumber home wins – frankly, that’ll be a disgrace if it happens.
Today’s 3-0 loss to Leeds was the worst of the lot for reasons I’ll go into later, but, suffice it to say for now that tonight this feels like 23/24’s lowest ebb so far and, for the first time, I’m reading the occasional message questioning whether Erol Bulut should be offered the contract extension he talked about a couple of days ago – in fact, there’s the odd call for him to be sacked..
Looked at from the perspective of us still only being three points off the Play Offs and fifteen points above the bottom three with a squad made of up of free transfers and loans because we’ve been under a transfer embargo, it seems absurd to be thinking in terms of another change of manager and it’s not a road I would consider going down now What I would say though is that, with the exception of the Boxing Day draw with Plymouth, which is akin to an oasis in a desert, I’ve found our last six home matches virtually unwatchable.
It’s only right mind to point out that it seems to me that the gap between the sides coming down with their first parachute payment and the rest of the Championship is as large as it’s ever been and our last two home opponents are among the trio relegated last season. As I’ve said before on here, Leicester, who won here in late December, are a Premier League side in all but name, Southampton beat us at a canter at their place about six weeks ago and I’m not exaggerating when I say Leeds could have scored seven or eight today.
So, I think it’s fair to say that we were always likely to lose to Leicester and, maybe, Leeds, but there’s losing and losing – for example, losing at Leicester and Ipswich in the manner we did in August is one thing and losing in the manner we’ve done in four of our last six home matches another completely.
We did beat Millwall in the aforementioned six home games,, even then though, it was a truly awful game of football with the only goal presented to us by the opposition’s goalkeeper. That goalkeeping howler apart, we never really looked like scoring against Millwall and the same could be said of the 1-0 losses to West Brom, Wayne Rooney’s woefully out of form Birmingham, the 2-0 defeat by Leicester and today’s hammering by Leeds.
I’m surprised to see that we’ve had as many as eleven on target efforts in those five matches (it’s still a pretty pitiful number though), but what would be really revealing would be if it were possible to find out how many of those eleven came in the first half when it was still 0-0 – I’ve no way of proving it, but my guess would be that it may well be none.
If I have any criticism of Erol Bulut, it would involve the manner in which his teams are being sent out to play in home games lately (strangely, like other City teams of recent seasons, we look a better side with more of a goal threat when we play away from home), The word “passive” is increasingly being used in relation to City home games and it was there in our attitude again today – an acceptance almost that the opposition are better than us exemplified by us going backwards on the rare occasions we have the ball more often than we go forward and a reluctance to commit more than one poor isolated soul to forward positions.
Rubin Colwill’s recent performances are not knocking doors down demanding that he start games, but I would say that he’s been doing enough to have earned a starting place given how little some others offer in attacking areas.
However, Bulut was typically defensive in his selection today and, to no great surprise, Colwill was a sub as the manager went with three defensive central midfielders, along with Josh Bowler and Karlan Grant out wide and Kion Etete as the poor sod up front.
I’ll not waste too much time on the game, but one thing I will say is that if Leeds miss out on a top two place on goal difference they may well think back to the January afternoon when they spurned so many chances down in Cardiff – City could only be grateful that Crysencio Sumomerville, possibly Leeds’ player of the season up to now, chose to have such an off day.
Leeds may have all of those big names and the advantages those parachute payments give them,, but their away record is patchy – Birmingham, Stoke and Preston, all below City in the table before kick off, have beaten them (albeit Leeds had their keeper set off against the last named) while bottom of the table Rotherham drew with them, so there must have been some e doubts in their ranks that might have been exploited by a more confident, committed and balanced team, but timid City started off as if in awe of Leeds (it was men against bollards according to a regular reader!).
It only took thirteen minutes for Leeds to score, but they could have had two before that. Junior Firpo made his way past three half hearted City tackles before setting up Patrick Bamford and the scramble that followed was ended by the striker scoring from about three yards out.
Manolis Siopis was one of the three tacklers that failed to stop Firpo in the build up to the first goal and, unfortunately, he was at fault with the second one as well as he surrendered possession to Glen Kamala who fed Summerville and when his shot was blocked, Dan James was able to score from even closer in than Bamford had been for his goal. While part of me was being dismissive of these tap in goals, the other part was thinking City would never have had anyone in such a position to benefit from such rebounds.
Joe Ralls went off before half time to be replaced by Colwill and there were two more changes at the interval with Siopis (who is really struggling in home games these days) and Etete being replaced by Andy Rinomhota for what I think is his first league appearance of the season and Yakou Meite drew the short straw to be attack leader.
It wasn’t hard to do, but the changes made us a bit more of an attacking threat in the second half, but when you consider that James hit the bar, Summerville hit the post with a penalty harshly awarded for a foul by Mark McGuinness and Jak Alnwick made more of the saves which made him our man of the match by a country mile, you can see that really it was just a case of more of the same.
Leeds’ third goal came late on and it encapsulated City’s afternoon as Rinomhota and Grant collided with each other to prompt a James inspired break that the visitors were in the process of botching until Georginio Rutter took control to fire home from fifteen yards.
Leeds manager Daniel Farke trotted out that tired old cliché about how Cardiff “is a difficult place to come to”, but it couldn’t hide that he was also saying that Leeds had just played out a very comfortable away game – I’ve read one or two Leeds fans saying that City were the worst side they’d played all season and, although all football fans have a tendency to overdo the positivity/negativity in the hours which follow their team playing, I do find it hard to believe that Leeds will have had an easier time of it on their travels so far this season.
On the transfer front, Erol Bulut confirmed after the game that City had signed Japanese defender Ryotaro Tsunado, but he is being loaned to FC Kortrijk for the rest of the season, so the wait goes on for what have become desperately needed reinforcements to a squad that is suddenly looking devoid of energy, inspiration and belief.
In total contrast, the under 18s picked up a seventh straight league win this lunchtime at Ipswich – Troy Perrett and Daniel Ola scoring the first half goals to secure a 2-0 victory.
In the Highadmit South Wales Alliance Premier Division, Ton Pentre secured a second successive win by beating Treherbert Boys and Girls Club 1-0 at home in a tightly contested derby. Ton move up to eighth in the twelve team division to make their position a bit more comfortable, but Treherbert, who led the league up to Christmas, have now dropped to fifth although they do have plenty of games in hand over three of the teams above them.
A fellow fan who sometimes follows club affairs even closer than me, told me a couple of weeks ago, that he thought Erol Bulut seemed more downbeat after his Xmas-time meeting with Vincent Tan than beforehand.
I’ve just seen a report that may explain why. It says that we’re currently only £1.5 Million below our Financial Fair Play threshold, which resets in May 2024.
Until then, the report said that unless we receive any of the reported £10M that we’re owed from Insurers over the Sala affair, we have very little scope for new players in this window unless we can offload some from our wage bill.
On the subject of the Leeds game, we wouldn’t be able to afford any of their squad yesterday – any of their bench would have walked straight into our first eleven and we also suffered from Leeds having a fit again Patrick Bamford, who looked full of confidence, especially first half.
Plus I don’t know if it’s just a coincidence, but long-standing womens player Danielle Broadhurst has just issued a pretty negative description of her and other players experiences at the club recently (e.g. broken promises) following the announcement if her departure last week.
Paul – another excellent piece from you.
There is little to get excited about at the moment & so it was yet again the case, when I saw yesterday’s team selection. I’m surprised you hadn’t mentioned it, but what was Bulut’s idea in seemingly pushing up Wintle as a no.10 first half? It was just bizarre. As Wintle was wandering all over the pitch in that first 30 mins or so, Leeds just sliced through us like a hot knife through butter. The writing was on the wall from early on and I joined my mate in agreeing, before kick off, that a score of 4-0 to them was probable.
I just don’t understand the poor starts we’ve been making at home, when a more upbeat, uptempo approach might stir our crowd up a bit more&maybe startle the opposition. Instead we shuffle it around the back with no real idea or plan on what we’re going to do past the halfway line. It really is so frustrating. I’ve seen mention that it was disappointing that the crowd, mainly the Canton Stand didn’t get behind the team. Let’s be fair, even the most fervent of our supporters, can’t be blamed for their “quietness” given the dross served up in front of them yesterday. Limpless and lifeless is how I described it.
It’s panning out to be more of a lower mid table season, than perhaps we’d thought after the first couple of months of the season.
Hey Bob, in response to your write-up, I have nothing to add as I didn’t ‘see’ any of the game but listened to the commentary. I’ll get to why in a moment. But just to comment Blue Bayou’s comment: I’ve heard the same thing. In fact, I had a message yesterday to say that it wouldn’t be a surprise to see him walk. It’s just rumours but his touchline demeanor yesterday, according to those who sit near me, was very, how shall we say….low… interspersed with peed-off. Danielle’s description says it all for me. The club’s stale.
As for the game….I didn’t go because once again they announced Sloper Rd. would be closed for 40mins after the game. They usually keep Sloper Rd open and car-free and keep the away supporters back until the home crowd has dispersed. This happened against Bristol City too. I only found out by chance as not all of us hang on to every announcement the club makes anymore. But as someone with mobility issues and I live less than 40 minutes (1.1 miles!) walk from the ground, I decided it wasn’t worth hanging around in the cold. Especially after the home games I’ve made the effort to go to recently. The club is getting good gates but most of the ST holders around me aren’t going. It’s pretty miserable. Add to that waves of Leeds supporters being shepherded up Penarth Rd by more police than a Rishi Sunak impromptu in central London, it just gets to me that home supporters are the ones kept back (or have to go out of their way to get out of the ground vicinity on foot). Yeah, this is a whinge and it may seem like a trivial thing for most, but with the dire football (again) and the lack of excitement this transfer window, I feel there are better things to occupy my time.
A belated Happy New Year to you and all your readers. I’m actually in pretty good shape and very happy…..apart from the football!
It’s been separately pointed out to me that what I reported about FFP isn’t quite right. Championship clubs that have financial input from owners are allowed to lose £13M per year for three years (total £39M), which rolls over each year. The clubs financial figures are due to be submitted to the EFL in March, containing a financial projection of the current year, plus the actual financial figures for the previous two years.
So in May the figures for the oldest year will roll off and be replaced by the actual figures for last year plus a projection for this year. I don’t have the clubs figures to hand so don’t know how it will affect us in May 2024 tbh, so maybe someone has.
In addition I have just seen from recent FFP proposals from UEFA, which recommends replacing the existing system with a percentage based system, so each clubs allowed losses would be a different sum, as it would be based on a fixed percentage of their income.
It’s been pointed out to me that what I wrote about FFP isn’t quite right.
Championship clubs which have financial input from their owner are allowed to make a loss of £39M over three years (based on £13M per year rolled over three years).
This is made up of the actual figures for the previous two complete years, plus a financial projection for the current year. Clubs submit their figures to the EFL in March, when the oldest historical year will roll off, and be replaced by the actual figures for last year plus a projection for the current year. These are the figures that the EFL will declare in May for each club. I don’t have the clubs figures for two years ago to hand, so I don’t know if they show a big loss or not that will roll off in May. However any major financial dealings in this transfer window would need to be part of our projected figures for this year, so will have a negative affect.
As it happens this process may change soon as UEFA have recently proposed changing the allowed losses from a fixed amount per team, to be based on a fixed percentage of income instead!
Thanks Paul as ever.
And thanks Blue for the Danielle Broadhurst info.
Just listened to a contributor to Talksport comparing 19 months of ten Hag to 7 months of Ange.
Let’s do our own comparison now…
… when we met on the opening day, we both had new managers. I reckoned back then, we had 4 players that would have made a composite team… now we have two… Jak and Rambo.
We have gone backwards.
I suggest we start talking to the boy from Blaenrhondda now.
TTFN,
Dai.
Thanks all for the replies. Pentyrch blue, my opinion is that it’s ridiculous to expect the crowd to be right behind the team from the word go. How many good games have there been at Cardiff City Stadium this season? People will say Swansea and it did turn into a great occasion, but, for seventy minutes it was poor stuff. Coventry was a good watch, Bristol City wasn’t bad and I enjoyed the Plymouth match – as for the rest, it’s been grim, attritional stuff even when we win. Don’t forget as well, that we’ve been garbage at home for the three seasons before this – given the size of the announced crowds this season, you only have to wonder as to what our crowds would be if the team started providing something worth watching!
Simon, good to hear from you again, your comments tie in with Pentyrch blues, the whole “match day experience” at Cardiff City Stadium has so little to offer supporters these days and decisions like the one to close Sloper Road are indicative of the club’s support being taken for granted.
The sort of relationship which makes someone a lifelong supporter of a club tends to be formed in your youth when you are most open to persuasion – in my case, matches against big European clubs and an improving team in the late sixties helped form the sort of relationship I talk of in my early teens, but, if I were, say, twelve or thirteen now, I’d not be thinking I want to spend the rest of my life supporting this club when I watched us play a home game – it’s a miserable experience and has been for years.
Blue Bayou. it seems that there is something going on in the background which is working against us being able to bring in players of the calibre we need. What you say makes sense, especially when you consider that the impression I get is that, after last year’s reduction to the wage bill, we would appear to have “pushed the boat out” in that regard over the summer – it wouldn’t surprise me at all if keeping within the boundaries of what I still call FFP is preventing the club from spending much this month. I’ve heard it said that we were relying on the receipt of £10 million as part of the settlement of one of the Sala court cases to come through, but it’s not done so yet and so we cannot spend as we wanted to in this window.
Dai, the comparison with our early season matches with Leeds and Leicester is something which has occurred to me as well – as you say, we clearly have gone back since then. Having Ramsey available in August has something to do with that of course, but I’d add that we’ve gone back since October and early November when we were doing okay without him. Okay, it was hardly an entertaining watch, but Erol Bulut had us going well with what is mostly the same group of players as we have now. Sadly, our manager looks incapable of repeating that these days and many more performances like Saturday’s will only see what I’ll call whispers against him currently calling for him to go get louder. My feeling though is that, to echo what Blue Bayou hints at, Bulut might walk, rather than be pushed.-
Paul, compadre…
Thinking about it, I reckon that you and Blue Bayou have got it right… Vincent will realise that Bulutball offers no real chance of being successful at Championship level, and not extend his contact.
On a happier note… as usual I am 2 months behind events, and have only just caught up with this Craig Bellamy interview. By golly… he comes over so well. Such a decent human being.
That said, I live in fear of him one day taking over as our manager. His Kompany inspired footballing philosophy would even make ME pine for Erol…!!
I post the link below on the offchance some of our MAYA brethren have, like me, missed seeing it.
https://youtu.be/nXoqgry7YVE?si=F2GlDAcG1eRPuguu
TTFN,
Dai
With more than half a season played, it seems very likely that the method which got Burnley into the Premier League will not be able to keep them there – from a distance it looks to me as if they are lacking in power in a league where the players tend to be good technically and are strong physically (it’s often the case that you don’t get both of these in the Championship), but I see little evidence of them changing the way they play. So, are Kompany ad Bellamy a pair of zealots who will stick to their plan no matter what? If they are then Bellamy would be a disaster as City manager, in the short term at least, because he would be coming to a club with a preponderance of senior players who would be uncomfortable adjusting to how he wanted to play.