Apologies for the dodgy Ghostbusters reference in the title, but I’m afraid the signs that Cardiff City are exactly the sort of team you want to face when you’re in need of a win is growing.
Doubtless the effects of two of City’s longest away trips of the season within four days of each other will be claimed as an excuse for losing 1=0 this afternoon to a miserably out of form Huddersfield Town side which had parted company with their Head Coach/manager Danny Schofield in midweek.
With the days of flying to away games in the north of England a thing of the past now, as City go almost everywhere by coach (albeit pretty luxurious ones I would guess), there is an element of justification to such thinking. However, I don’t think it can be used to completely explain away a performance that was as lethargic and lightweight as today’s through most of the ninety minutes. At times, City looked so slow and tired that you could be forgiven for thinking that they’d all cycled the two hundred and twenty odd miles up to Huddersfield!.
If Steve Morison’s pre game instructions to his team were that he wanted them to be second to every ball, sloppy and slow witted in possession and to make a team who would have been in not the best frame of mind feel comfortable from the first whistle, then they carried them out to the letter to the degree that it could be claimed that the goal was coming when it arrived as early as the eighth minute.
Huddersfield played exactly like you’d expect a team that had lost two Head Coaches and six matches out of eight this season since their unlucky Play Off Final defeat by Forest back in May. There was plenty of commitment and urgency, but not a lot of style. However, that was enough to deservedly see off a City side that had more poise than their opponents, but wasted their one golden chance to equalise and displayed what is becoming an all too familiar fallibility when it came to both creativity and finishing.
Huddersfield were more dynamic and the better chances tended to fall to them – especially as City forlornly chased an equaliser in the closing minutes.
It was as if that fluent and assured first half at Middlesbrough had never happened. On this evidence, nothing was gained from that performance when the team that has now scored four times in ten and a half matches found their shooting boots for one glorious forty five minute period. Indeed, on today’s showing, you have to think that we used up about six games worth of goals on Tuesday night.
Steve Morison hinted at changes in the starting line up when asked about those two long coach journeys and he was true to his word as he came up with a strange looking selection which appeared to feature wing backs and wingers or it may have been a flat back five with full backs – it was really hard to tell what the formation we were playing was supposed to be.
What was certain was that it was the same three central defenders, Mahlon Romeo was the right back cum wing back, but, after looking none too assured in his half an hour or so on the pitch on Tuesday, Niels Nkounkou was back on the left enabling Callum O’Dowda to push forward while Jaden Philogene came in on the right. All of this effectively binned the two strikers approach which, for forty five minutes anyway, had worked a lot better than any of the other attacking combinations seen so far.
Mark Harris was back on the bench then, leaving Callum Robinson to plough a lone furrow up front – it also meant that there were just two central midfielders in Ryan Wintle and Andy Rinomhota.
Sometimes though, formations count for nothing if most of your side isn’t “at it” both mentally and physically and, although they did improve as the first half wore on, City were so slow out of the blocks, it was untrue.
The game’s decisive moment came early on as the veteran Jordan Rhodes drilled a low shot from the edge of the penalty area past Ryan Allsop who did not bother diving for a shot he was never going to save. It was a lovely piece of finishing and it’s tempting to say it was of a quality that we cannot match, but It was no better than Romaine Sawyers’ finish against Luton and Mark Harris’ on Tuesday – the players have shown they can score good goals, it’s the more mundane ones that are, almost completely, lacking from this team’s CV.
Once Rhodes’ shot hit the back of the net, it was impossible to avoid a suspicion that the game was as good as over from a City perspective. After all, probably the most worrying aspect of a pretty worrying start to this season has been that we have not once come back from going a goal behind – once that happens, we lose.
Mind you, we had our best chance to break that particular duck so far today when, from nowhere, we were awarded a penalty. It came about ten minutes after Rhodes’ goal when Huddersfield half cleared a corner to the edge of the penalty area where Rinomhota ducked to get his head to the high bouncing ball only to be caught near his face by Tino Anjorin’s high boot. I’ve seen some City fans claiming it was a harsh decision, but, for me, although it was unfortunate as there was no intention to play the man, it was definitely a penalty – Dean Whitestone got it right as far as I’m concerned.
Anyway, arguments about the validity of the award were rendered redundant as Robinson’s attempt to score his first goal for his new club ended in pretty ignominious failure as his weak effort was easily saved by Lee Nicholls diving to his right – once he chose the right way to go, the keeper was always going to save it.
Strangely, although never hitting the heights of Tuesday, City gradually worked their way back into some sort of supremacy as Huddersfield’s early authority diminished and Robinson again should have done better as, looking offside, he received a long pass forward in oceans of space some twenty yards from goal with no one blocking a run in on Nicholls, as Huddersfield defenders waited for an offside flag which never came, Robinson miscontrolled the ball and City’s second best chance of the game had gone.
After the game, Steve Morison claimed his side should have had a second penalty. Presumably, he meant when Philogene was fouled right on the edge of the penalty area. It was certainly a close call as to whether it was inside or outside the box, but, having got one penalty, we were always unlikely to get a second one on such a tight call.
City had what is becoming their norm of two on target efforts per game. The first was Robinson’s penalty and the second was O’Dowda’s crisply hit effort from the free kick which was straight at Nicholls.
Half time saw what has to be seen as an admission that Morison had got his selection wrong as Nkounkou and Philogene made way with Mark Harris and Romaine Sawyers coming on with O’Dowda moving to wing back, as City reverted to the system used at Middlesbrough.
This time though, it was more second half Middlesbrough than first – not because, we were forced to defend all of the time, more that we barely looked like scoring.
Despite a lot of possession and territorial advantage as well as another tactical tweak to a back four as Perry Ng moved to right back as Romeo was replaced by Rubin Colwill (Ng was subsequently replaced by Tom Sang and Sheyi Ojo came on for Rinomhota very late on), Huddersfield were only seriously troubled when Nicholls just about managed to dive on a Harris cross shot with Robinson ready to pounce from point blank range and they had few problems holding out for a first clean sheet of the season..
Huddersfield’s right to all three points was confoirmed during the second half as, while City huffed and puffed to little effect, Rhodes forced Allsop into a diving save with a close range header, Cedric Kipre (our best player for me) robbed Jack Ridoni as he looked certain to score and there was a shocking miss by Sorba Thomas in added time after Jack Simpson had been robbed by Patrick Jones.
So, City’s weird away record continues whereby we play well and avoid defeat under the midweek floodlights (see West Brom and Misddlesbrough) and perform feebly in losing in natural light on the weekends as at Reading, Bristol City, Millwall and now Huddersfield.
There was more poor fare at Cardiff City Stadium last night as the under 21s conceded five again in losing 5-3 to QPR. All of this after we’d begun well with James Crole opening the scoring with a fine header from an Ollie Tanner free kick. The visitors were well on top however by the time they scored three times in about five minutes just before the interval.
Matthew Turner saved a penalty early in the second half, but when he was beaten to make it 4-1, I gave up on watching the match and thereby missed what, apparently, was a great free kick goal by Caleb Hughes (I’ve now seen it and it was top quality) and another good finish by Crole,
Based on what I saw though, it was another game where the new men brought in during the summer failed to impress, but, to be fair, QPR had four players (including Welsh international George Thomas) in their side with pretty extensive first team experience – they were a strong team for this level.
There was better news this lunchtime as the under 18s gained an added time win at Hull. Gabriele Biancheri opened the scoring and Tanatswa Nyakuwha regained the lead from the penalty spot. In the second half, there was a second equaliser for the home team only for sub Cody Twose to win it for City beyond the ninety minute mark.
In the Highadmit South Wales Alliance Premier League, AFC Porth’s struggles continued with a 2-1 home loss to Bridgend Street, but Treherbert Boys and Girls Club’s good start to life in the First Division continued with a 1-1 draw at Cwm Welfare.
Something else I wanted to mention is that I’ve had a couple of E-mails from readers who have been unable to send messages to the Feedback section on here. There has been no problem with several regular contributors, but if you find that you cannot post your comments on my articles, send them to me at paul.evans8153@hotmail.com and I can put them on here for you.
Finally, as has been the habit at the start of a new season in recent years, can I ask readers if they’re willing to make a donation towards the running costs of the blog. I say running costs towards the blog, but, that’s not really true this time because this year any donations will go towards costs incurred in the production and publication of the book I aim to have out for sale by October.
As mentioned this time last year, I decided to do another review of a season to follow on from Real Madrid and all that which was about 1970/71. This one is about the 1975/76 season and will be called Tony Evans walks on water. I finished writing the book over the weekend and now it’s a question of tidying it up, proof reading, inserting a few photos and designing a cover before sending it off for printing.
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