In his pre game media interview, Doncaster Rovers manager Grant McCann spoke about his team’s match at Cardiff City Stadium in December and said with a perfectly straight face that his side could have scored five or six.
I very much doubt whether anyone will get to read this who is not aware of what happened in Donny’s first meeting of the season with City, but if there is, I daresay that they’re now having a quiet chuckle to themselves after checking to see where both sides are in the League One table.
However, the thing is, Mr McCann was telling the truth – his team, which was in a terrible run of form at the time, caused our defence all sorts of problems before succumbing to a 4-3 defeat with Joel Bagan’s match winner coming in the one hundredth minute.
I can recall a couple of fine saves by Nathan Trott at 3-3 I think it was and Brandon Hanlon being put clean through at 2-3 for his side only to shoot across Trott, but also a couple of yards wide when he should have at least been able to hit the target.
I’m sure there were other close shaves for City that I can’t recall now, because that game marked a cessation in a run of mad home games where 4-3s, 3-2s and 3-0s (i.e. the sort of scores you could be forgiven for thinking had been done away by the authorities if you only watched us playing at home since 2022!) abounded.
For a while, we managed to tighten things up at the back without losing our ability to score goals on a regular basis- a not inconsiderable feat given how open we were for much of the first half of the game.
I thought our defensive problems were behind us as we strung together a dozen unbeaten matches and we were restricting our opponents to less than two on target efforts per match.
However, Plymouth last weekend when we conceded five in losing put an end to all of that – we had a miserable time of it in defence with only one member of four at the back (Perry Ng) having what I’d call an okay game.
Plymouth’s front two dominated our centrebacks last weekend and with our left side being seriously out of sorts, we were, to use another boxing analogy after the runaway success of my last one a fortnight ago, looking like a slugger who had a puncher’s chance, but had to be hit from three or four good shots from their opponent before being able to land a decent blow for themselves.
I said in what passes for my pre match prediction when I post the Seven Decades quiz on here that i didn’t have a clue what was going to happen in today’s match at what I presume is still called the Keepmoat Stadium, but I can tell you I was concerned.
For a while, things had been going swimmingly and even I, as someone who never predicts things like automatic promotion or title outcomes, was beginning to think promotion was in the bag. After Plymouth though, the usual doubts returned as I feared a reappearance of that awful term “doing a Cardiff”
After all, if Donny were able to give us such a fright when they were winning one out of sixteen I believe it was, what could they do to a fragile City team when they were in a run of sixteen points from nine games?
However, in the event, my fears proved groundless as we equalled our best winning margin of the season and scored four for the sixth time as we won 4-0 to leave Doncaster a well b eaten team by the end.
With Yousef Salech back in Denmark as his gradual recovery from what is now being described as a neck ligament injury continues and Isaak Davies still not in the squad despite him, apparently, being in training all week, City were dealt a further blow as Omari Kellyman was also missing, presumably with an injury.
Rubin Colwill came in for his first start since his recovery from injury and he also took over the captaincy from Calum Chambers who was replaced by Dylan Lawlor. Cian Ashford was recalled at the expense of Chris Willock and Ryan Wintle came in for David Turnbull who had been described as doubtful beforehand by BBM.
So, more young Welsh talent in the starting eleven and also a rather odd looking substitutes bench with no goalkeeper, four defenders, one midfielder, a winger and a forward who seems to want to come deep to get involved these days.
To make matters worse, the pitch didn’t look the best and, more importantly, didn’t play well. I’m sure this was a factor in a careless opening by City as possession was given up much too easily and although Ollie Tanner forced home keeper Thimothee Lo-Tutala into an early save on his near post, it was the home team who posed the first serious goal threat.
Luck was not on our side when an errant City pass was cleared straight into the path of Hanlon who was suddenly clear of a square looking central defence, but Gabriel Osho was able to throw the home forward off his stride and Lawlor was then able to get a slight block on the shot to take it over the bar.
Lawlor celebrated his block in front of the near three thousand traveling fans. It was a good example of him doing what he’s in the team for first and foremost. With a player like Lawlor though with extra facets to his game (especially for League One level) there is always the chance that he’ll come up with something more “eye catching” and he was to do that today with bells on!
The pitch remained a problem, but it was easy to forget that, as another team who want get the ball down and play, it also presented a problem for Donny and, truth be told, it was a challenge they never really looked like solving.
It is an indication of the quality we have all over the pitch that, despite being weakened by the absence of the two players who are arguably the best two central strikers at the club, City began to come to terms with the pitch.
Gradually, a series of runs from deep by the likes of the Colwill brothers, Ashford, Tanner and even Ng got the home fans increasingly agitated because the linesman involved was judging them to be perfectly timed.
City’s probing was making them look the favourites to score the vital first goal and when it came, the word that came to mind for me was classy. In a move reminiscent of the solitary goal against Exeter on Boxing Day, Lawlor stepped forward from the back with the ball and clipped a lovely ball to Alex Robertson, who’d made one of those clever runs I mentioned earlier, and the midfielder didn’t need to break his stride as he chested the ball down and guided his shot beyond Lo-Tutala from eight yards.
City were largely in control after that as half time approached, but the home team had another chance when Joel Bagan’s headed clearance on the far post fell into Harry Clifton’s path and the former Wales under 21 international snatched at a presentable chance as he shot hurriedly wide from ten yards.
A goal to the good at the break and coping better than their opponents with the troublesome pitch, it looked like City could get the result they needed to put last week’s slip up behind them and, within two minutes of the restart, we were in a position where only sloppiness was going to cost us the three points.
Our first goal was so easy on the eye – in previous seasons, I’m pretty sure it would be on the shortlist for any goal of the season, but the truth is that we’ve scored so many really good goals this season that it’s got no chance of making that short list I mentioned.
By contrast, I’ll say here and now that our second goal will definitely make that shortlist! It was all Dylan Lawlor’s own work as well as he picked up the ball some five yards outside our penalty area and, using that unusual straight backed running style which I’m sure helps him keep his head up so that he’s more aware of what’s around him, he just kept traveling with the ball (to use the coach speak term which most us used to call dribbling).
A little burst of pace took him clear of two home players, then when he went past a third red and white hooped shirt he was now into the sort of area he was in when he scored his previous goal against Leyton Orient. Lawlor now had space to run onto and there was a ball to the unmarked Robertson I think it was on for him, but the centreback (yes centreback!) used the scorer of our first gn as someone to distract the remaining defenders as he burst past another Donny player into the penalty area to coolly roll the ball into the corner of the net.
If Lawlor’s first career goal was good, and the last thing you’d expect from someone playing in his position, then this was brilliant or, to use the word I came out with at the time, ridiculous!
Hardly surprisingly after such a stunning contribution, Lawlor’s play got a little sloppy after that and it made sense that someone who was making his first start in weeks following a spell out injured should be replaced by Will Fish around the hour mark.
By then though, we were three up and I can guarantee this one is not on that shortlist I talked about! That’s not to disregard the contribution of Rubin Colwill as he beat his man on the right before crossing low to where Ashford and Doncaster right back Jamie Sterry challenged for the ball on the far post an the net.
Replays of the goal showed that the ball had hit Ashford and flew in although it was pretty clear that he knew little about it.
It was an unusual game in that, just like against Wimbledon and Plymouth, the losing team had more goal attempts. In this case, it was fifteen to fourteen in Doncaster’s favour, but their only on target attempt came from Luke Molyneux who caused Trott few problems with his well struck effort from twenty yards.
City were hardly peppering Lo-Tatula with shots either with just the four on target attempts and it was Callum Robinson who had the last of them when he maintained City’s one hundred per cent record from on target attempts when he intercepted a Sterry pass and scored his first goal of 2026 with an assured finish from fifteen yards.
Robinson, on for Rubin, was one of the other four substitutions City made with Ronan Kpakio and Callum Scanlon, who provided a promising twenty odd minute cameo, coming on for the full backs and Chris Willock replacing Tanner.
I make it that I’ve mentioned all of the sixteen players City used today apart from the one who, despite Lawlor’s eye catching contribution, was my City Man of the match. I make no apologies for repeating something I said in another match reaction piece on here not long ago – when he plays like this, Joel Colwill is like a force of nature.
It was a day of big wins for the top three with Lincoln matching our scoreline in their home win over inconsistent Blackpool and Bolton scoring one more in winning 5-1 at Exeter. However, below that, it was a good day for us as the rest of the top six were beaten.
Stockport completed a bad few days with a second successive defeat, this one by 2-1 at Stevenage, Bradford’s poor away form continued with a 2-1 loss at Reading and Huddersfield were beaten 1-0 at struggling Wigan – to make matters worse for Stockport and Bradford, they had both gone 1-0 up.
While City were playing, the women’s team were in action at Cardiff City Stadium against the Wrexham side which beat them on penalties in the Ardal Cup Final last weekend and the north Waleans took a potentially decisive three points in the title race with us by winning 3-1.
This follows on from a frankly woeful performance for our under 21s last night as they went down 1-0 in appalling conditions against Swansea at Leckwith. Others may disagree, but the highlight of this match came early on when commentator John Donovan again mentioned the blog as he apologised for calling my the old Bob Wilson last time he was working on an under 21 game – I hope and believe John knows no apology was necessary due to the fact that, indeed, I am very old I’m afraid!
It really was poor fare though even if allowances had to be made for the conditions – Swansea weren’t great, but they were definitely the better side against a City team that didn’t manage what I’d call a realistic goal attempt all night. The closest they came to an equaliser was when Jake Davies went down in the penalty area after appearing to be pushed by a visiting defender. For my part, it was a decision which could have gone either way and I wouldn’t blame the ref if he had been influenced by the quagmire of a pitch in his decision making.
Better news was that a Jack Sykes hat trick gave the under 18s an impressive 3-0 win at Brentford this lunchtime.
