There are two absolute certainties that come with following Cardiff City, football's greatest soap opera of all. One is that just at the very moment you are happy with the club and feel is all well, they will kick you in the nads. The other is that the football team never do anything the easy way. And the last 24 hours provided both of those but ended on a glorious high as Cardiff City beat fellow play-off placed outfit Leicester City to cement their spot in 4th and open a 8 point gap over 7th spot with just 6 games to go of the league season.
The game was no classic but Cardiff carved a 2-0 interval lead and had the hapless Kelvin Etuhu put home the simplest of headers right on half-time, the rest of the contest would have been irrelevant. However Leicester hit back early, Cardiff lost players to injury and then Gyepes took one for the team by getting a red card with 20 to go denying an opponent bearing down on goal. The vocal encouragement from City fans was immense as City's 10 men played out that closing spell with no centre halves, a winger at left back and Chris Burke no more than a passenger with a pulled hamstring and Warren Feeney pretty much a passenger too because that's how he is anyway. The character and fight of the team has been immense and has now taken the club to within a whisker of a play-off place.
The build up to the game was equally dramatic. Life was quite upbeat after the traumatic times at the club but a swift reminder of its continued troubles came with breaking news that Broken Cardiff had a fresh cash crisis. Players and staff hadn’t been paid, up to five key investors chipping in funds to underwrite the monthly wage bills but with the bulk from T.G. and the Malaysians, theirs was supposedly held up in international cyberspace (sounds like a job for Dr. Who!).
The conspiracy theorists will think it was more to do with T.G. just demonstrating that he now runs the show and sent a powerful message to allow his offer (he flies in for the weekend Swansea game) or the club has not future. Regardless, it served as another act of embarrassment and ridicule for Peter Ridsdale … as if he could possibly be more of an embarrassment than he already is.
However, funds arrived today so Michael Chopra duly pocketed another £60-80k, Ross McCormack can invest in a new stash of Tennant’s Super Extra and pay for his taxi rides, Soloman Taiwo can purchase some new cushions to plonk under his arse on the bench (the ones he has must be worn out by now) and Mark Kennedy can have the new sand wedge to attach to his left boot for that continual stream of dinked balls up the field. With bounties in pockets and no need for us to organise a bucket collection for them, we could all concentrate on a vital game.
Injured players were still injured, Bothroyd was still suspended but Dave Jones made two changes from the side that started in the weekend's away win at Crystal Palace as Michael Chopra reverted to the bench and Ross McCormack started. Chops later had the ignominy of seeing Warren Feeney come off the bench instead of him too. The other change saw Mark Kennedy start ahead of Tony Capaldi.
CARDIFF CITY: Marshall; Kennedy-Blake-Gyepes-Quinn; Whittingham-Rae-McPhail-Burke; McCormack-Etuhu.
Leicester have having a superb season after being promoted to the Championship last summer and are probably doing better than expected. Cardiff memorably knocked them out of the F.A. in January to set up the day trip to Chelsea but the Foxes got their revenge last month in the Championship. However in collecting just 1 point in the last 9 (2 of those games at home) culminating a comic defeat at Derby last weekend when keeper Weale somehow managed to outdo Enckleman, somehow allowing the most innocuous of back-passes simple to roll by him and into the net. That came here below Cardiff and remain in the most vulnerable 6th spot but 4 points ahead of Blackpool, the nearest side to them.
LEICESTER CITY: Weale;
The Foxes brought around 700 fans with them in a crowd of 20,438. Fans had the novelty of an evening game kicking-off in daylight as clocks went forward last weekend but it didn't feel like spring or summer at all on a chilly night with strong gusts and heavy rain at times too.
Unusually, City defended the Family Stand end first half dealing with those guts and assorted crisp packets and burger trays flying around. City started well, Gyepes going close at a corner and then "Eddie" Etuhu breaking through the middle before playing his first, but nowhere near his last, misplaced pass of the night before, for the third time in four games, City made the perfect start with a goal in the opening 10 minutes.
McPhail played an intelligent ball which was scrambled away but he returned it with a header, Etuhu shot on the turn, Weale pushed the ball away but straight into the path of ROSS McCORMACK who stabbled home for his 5th goal of the season setting City fans into song. Moments later, Chris Burke went on a strong run, beat a defender, the ball rebounded kindly for him but he swept his shot just wide.
Leicester are a good footballing side and responded well playing around City and passing well but crucially, they didn't really threaten too much into the penalty area although credit must go to Blake, Gyepes, Kennedy and the excellent Paul Quinn having his finest hour in a City shirt for being strong and resolute. For all their pressure, the next key chance was Cardiff's too as Chris Burke skinned a defender and sent over a cross that McCormack back across goal only to be denied his second by a fine save or clearance off the line.
City had to make an enforced change a few minutes before the interval as Darcy Blake departed with a neck injury, I think, with Adam Matthews coming on and Paul Quinn moving into centre half. Matthews made his introduction with an amazing 70 yard run with power and pace taking him past 4 or 5 Leicester players and bursting into the box before firing over. Had it gone in, it would have been one of the best goals of any season, not just this one.
Around this point, I commented to people around me how City weren't getting enough players in the box as plenty of crosses were going in but nobody was near them. Moments later, a ball was worked into the box, McCormack got clear but Weale saved his shot, Rae was clear but passed back to WHITTINGHAM who was also clear and bundled the ball home despite the keeper's best efforts. Whitts 22nd goal of the season, amazing.
That came on half-time but there was still time for more drama as Leicester took a corner which almost flew in direct, Marshall plamed it away but with some thinking it had already crossed the line. Not seen it on tv but behind that goal, I didn't think it had. From that, City charged down the other end, Burke sent over the perfect cross for Etuhu who gave every impression he was a 10 yr old heading a ball for the first time with eyes closed and got barely anything on the ball. That was a miss that almost came back to haunt City.
Leicester returned with the lump of an old war horse that is Steven Howard and he took just 7 minutes to make his mark. A corner saw Leicester whip it in, in the same way as Palace did on the weekend, Marshall got a hand to it but not strong enough and the ball was turned back on goal and home by HOWARD from 6 yards through a crowd. How many times has he scored against us?
Leicester tried to apply more pressure but the game was ragged and not helped by heavy rain and water developing in places on the pitch then City were disrupted as Mark Kennedy went off with what looked like a hamstring strain, Capaldi came on. City were under the cosh and balls up front were coming straight back as "Eddie" Etuhu looked out on his feet but he got the biggest personal cheer of the night as he headed on a throw in, City fans wildly cheered him finally putting his head on a ball! Now some fans like Feeney but I don't rate him at all sorry, not for this level of football anyway. It was a shock to me to see Jones use him instead of Chopra who always closes down play and chases the ball and players so is good value in these situations, much more effective than Feeney can ever be in my view.
No sooner had Cardiff made their third and final change when disasters struck. The first saw Chris Burke pulled up with his hamstring. He tried to run it off but knew he had problems and signalled to go off but as he did, Leicester sub and Everton loanee James Vaughan beat the offside trap and was clean through on goal. Gabor Gyepes chased him but was never going to catch him so he took one for the team as he rugby tackled Vaughan on the edge of the box for a straight red card. It seemed a killer blow but it helped preserve the win in the final analysis.
The impressive Paul Gallagher screwed the resulting free-kick wide but Cardiff had 20 minutes to survive with 10 men, one playing with a pulled hamstring, two full backs playing as centre halves, Whitts playing as a left back and Warren Feeney to play as Warren Feeney.
Those final 20 minutes became 25 with added time and were torture as Leicester completely dominated, spreading play, going wide, trying to go around us and through this but, to a man, City were magnificent, throwing bodies in the way, having Marshall bellowing out orders behind them and giving everything they had and a bit more besides.
The clocks at either end of the ground seemed to take an eternity and there must have been 15,000 of us willing those seconds and minutes to go faster and counting down the remaining time. With nerves frayed, City fans responded as City fans do, up on their feet chanting and willing their side on. The atmosphere, tension and noise in those closing minutes in amongst City fans was the best yet at the new stadium.
Shots went wide, headers went over, shots went over, headers went wide but so heroic was City's defending that David Marshall only had one tip over save to make for all that never ending pressure.
Final whistle and the ecstasy and relief was fantastic. Make no mistake, this wasn't just a big win but a massive win and to achieve it in those circumstances made it all the better.
Dave Jones and his squad cannot be praised highly enough for recent efforts. That went in March looking down and out on and off the pitch. The play-off chasers were set to swallow us into the pack and we have had to cope with injuries, illness, suspensions and a serious lack of numbers in the squad. Playing midweek/weekend all March seemed as though it would be too much to cope with 16 points from 8 matches in 24 days. We should be proud of them all for achieving that against the odds.
