Monday night’s 2-0 win over Watford at Cardiff City Stadium took City’s Development team’s unbeaten run to four matches and it cannot be denied that they are playing better in what is their best run of the campaign up to now.
Yesterday afternoon at Leckwith, they were able to keep the sequence going in a game against Bristol City which may or may not have included two sending offs (I’ll come to that later), but, as happens so often with this side these days, my overall feeling on the final whistle was one of a disappointment – primarily because they had, once again, done something that they seem to excel at.
Granted, the lead was not a two goal one this time (the match finished 1-1), but,as has happened too many times during last season and this one, the Under 23s dropped points in an encounter that they had complete control of at one stage.
To be fair, there were some mitigating circumstances this time because they went into the game with a team and a bench completely lacking in natural strikers and packed full of midfield players.
With Kenneth Zohore still ruled out with a calf injury for today’s match at Everton, Danny Ward and Gary Madine were, presumably, members of the first team squad which left for Liverpool yesterday. Also, even if the recent policy of not picking first choice Academy team players at this level (unless they’re playing in the Welsh Youth Cup this weekend, the youngsters do not have a game over the next couple of days) was discontinued, Isaak Davies is injured and Dan Griffiths has just returned from playing three games in six days with Wales Under 19s.
So, under the circumstances, using James Waite, who has enjoyed some success playing as a striker at this level in the past, as an attack leader supported by Nathaniel Mendez-Lange made sense – even if Cameron Coxe continued his jack of all trades impersonation at this level by playing as a winger on the other flank.
Mendez-Lange (who marked his comeback from a long term injury with a goal on Monday) was not the only first squad member involved as Jazz Richards started at right back following a recent absence through injury, while Loic Damour, whose absence from the Everton squad tends to confirm the suspicion that he will be one of those who will be allowed to leave next month, captained the side.
With the wurzels including Bailey Wright, Jens Hegeler and Welsh Under 21 international Joe Morrell, who was a regular in Cheltenham’s team during a loan spell there last season, there was a larger than normal representation of players with pretty extensive first team experience involved, but this wasn’t really reflected in any increase on the “normal” quality on show.
As they did throughout the match really, Cardiff’s back four defended well when they had to during a quiet beginning as Richards did excellently to snuff out a dangerous counter attack and Ciaron Brown made sure he got to an inviting low cross first.
Up the other end, Mendez-Laing showed he had the ability to cause the Bristol defence problems with an effort from distance that did not miss by too much and it was the winger who opened the scoring in the eighteenth minute with what, from my position at the other end of the pitch, looked a strange goal.
Mendez-Laing was worked into a position where he had space to run at his marker and went past him by using a step over before striking what I assumed was a low cross aimed at the far post, only for it to find the net on the near post. My first thoughts were that it was either a brilliant bit of finishing which fooled keeper Jonjo Wollacott completely or a bit of a fluke through a mishit centre – either way, the goalkeeper seemed culpable.
The truth is though that it was none of these things – apparently, there was a deflection of the covering Wright which left Wollacott with no chance.
Mendez-Laing was involved again shortly afterwards as he again got clear down the right and this time his low cross found it’s intended target as Coxe probably should have done better than nudge the ball just wide from close range.
City were playing with some fluency now and Wollacott was, perhaps, lucky to avoid being penalised as he clattered into Waite outside of the penalty area as the City man moved on to a defence splitting pass – Waite reached the ball first and lobbed the keeper only for a wurzels defender to get back to acrobatically clear off the line.
For a while a second home goal looked inevitable as Wollacott made fine saves to deny Tyrone Duffus’ header and turn Waite’s effort out for a corner via the upright – this was one of Duffus’ last contributions as he was he replaced because of injury by another midielder in Jacob Evans just before the interval.
Half time couldn’t come soon enough for the wurzels and, as often happens, the break in proceedings brought about a change in the nature of a game. City were never to look as threatening again and the only time they looked capable of adding to their tally in the second half that I can recall came when Evans neatly beat his marker and hit a shot from twenty five yards which smacked back off an upright.
Bristol missed a great chance to equalise when Wright nodded wide from a good position shortly after the break, but, otherwise, the sides tended to cancel each other out for much of the second forty five minutes.
Perhaps the main reason for City’s decline as an attacking force could be found in one of the other substitutions they had to make around the hour mark. I don’t mean the one which saw Richards go off because his replacement, Ryan Price, did well at right back, but Mendez-Laing going off really did bring home the lack of attacking options in the fifteen players available to Jared Harvey.
Jamie Veale, who I feel should be a regular starter at this level, came on for Mendez-Lange, but this meant that Waite moved over to the right and Waite had to fill in as a centre forward (a position I have never seen him play in before and one that he hardly seems ideally equipped for). As mentioned earlier, I think Veale should not be on the bench for this team, but, under these circumstances, the wiser move for me seemed to be to bring the other sub Lawrence Wooton on to play on the right and keep Waite playing through the middle.
For a while it looked as if Coxe was having a go as attack leader, but the result was the same – the ball was not “sticking” when City played it up to their striker and so they were now having to do a lot of defending. Not that this was any great bother to the home side because the wurzels seldom posed a threat and the one time they did work a good shooting position for themselves, Matt Hall saved easily from a mishit effort by sub Tom Richards.
However, when a team with a one goal lead is forced on to the back foot as much as City were being, there is always a decent chance that an equaliser will result and it duly did with ten minutes left as Richard was left with a simple finish following good work down the right by Marcus Day.
After that, Bristol looked to be the game’s more likely winners, but, in truth, neither side seriously threatened to come up with that decisive goal and the only noteworthy events were the one, or was it two, red cards.
My excuse for the lack of clarity in what follows is that I had made my way to the car park at the Athletics Stadium (which has a much improved new pitch laid by the way) and so was more than a hundred yards away from the relevant action on a murky afternoon which floodlights that are not a patch on the ones on the main ground across the road struggled to illuminate. However, I was not aware of the sending off of Morrell (as reported on the Bristol Live website, but not mentioned on City’s CF11 twitter feed) for what appears to have been a reaction to what, even from my distance away, looked like a bad tackle by Coxe.
I was not surprised to see Coxe trudging off after being shown a card (it was impossible to be sure what colour it was!), but as to how, where and why Morrell made his departure (if there was one!), I’m afraid I don’t have a clue.
