After suffering their worst away defeat for 31 years last weekend then fighting back to claim an inglorious midweek draw at the Championship’s worst and already relegated side, Calamitous Cardiff City now ruined Ninian Park’s last ever league match, finished their automatic promotion hopes and left their play-off chances in extreme jeopardy by crashing 3-0 at home to Ipswich Town.
Photos can be found at:
http://nigelblues.blogspot.com/2009/04/cardiff-city-0-ipswich-town-3-in.html
City should still make the play-offs but confidence is sinking fast and anything anyone can cock it up, then our lot certainly have the look of being more than capable. Swansea lost at Sheffield United so their season is over (fair does, they did well though) but Preston grabbing a late win from behind at Birmingham in an evening game was a further shock and means Cardiff still have it all to do.
The combinations for City to make the play-off are;
- Securing just a point at 11th placed Sheffield Wednesday who can get no higher.
- If they lose, only Preston and Burnley have to win their final matches to pass City (both are home to QPR and Bristol City respectively).
- If City lose and Preston win, Cardiff can still make it by matching or bettering the number of goals scored by Preston (i.e. if they win 1-0, we lose 1-2)
How Cardiff have got themselves in this situation in the first place is deeply worrying. Two terrible defeats in the last 3 games and how can a side who lost just 4 of their first 31 Championship games now lose 5 of their last 14, the majority to ordinary sides? In Ninian Park’s send off, City were bloody awful and looked more faded than the stadium itself.
After a bright start and another missed penalty, City individually and collectively fell apart. No shape, no movement, no closing down players, completely unhinged and disjointed, truly awful goals conceded and some bizarre tactics and substitutions. In some ways, it felt fitting to those of us who attended Ninian Park regularly in the 80’s and 90’s were ‘treated’ to this type of debacle all too regularly.
However instead of the 3,500 hardcore City fans sparsely dotted around the place then, Ninian Park was yet again a home-sell out, thousands more would have been there if they could have. The poignancy of the occasion, however, was diminished to some extent by the likelihood (I hope!!) that there will be more 1 more game – a play-off semi-final leg.
If that pushes us towards Wembley and within 90 minutes of the Premiership, I hope that’s how I remember our 99 year grand old lady rather than today’s fiasco which, to rub salt into the wounds, ended in high farce as the crowd were made to wait over 15 minutes for a ‘grand celebration’, the kicking of 300 autographed balls into the crowd and a firework display.
On trooped an embarrassed looking squad in white t-shirts (they may as well have been white flags after this surrender), the sort of pyrotechnics that anyone can perform by holding a matchstick to your ar*e after a curry and the cheapiest, nastiest seaside plastic balls that, with a swirling wind, the players couldn’t even kick into the front row of stands. Even Poundland would have been too embarrassed to sell them! My lad got one by running pitchside, his was signed by only 3 players (Rae, Gyepes and I haven’t a clue who the third is but that doesn’t matter – those balls won’t last 2 weeks anyway).
That shambolic send-off matched City’s performance. Heavy rain had been forecast but the only shower were those players in blue on the pitch.
You hoped City’s highly unimpressive display but stirring fightback at Charlton in Tuesday would have been sufficient to overcome nerves and instil confidence and Dave Jones was boosted by the return of Kevin McNaughton and opted to start with Chris Burke, City’s inspiration off the bench in midweek, for the continuing out of sorts Michael Chopra. City still had no goalkeeper back-up with Dimi clearly not going to be allowed to play for the club again and you have to wonder what Stuart Taylor’s mystery injury is about or has he been punished after criticising City’s display and his defence at Preston as embarrassing? Either way and unconvincing as our keepers have been, it weakens City at a crucial time.
CARDIFF CITY: Heaton; McNaughton-Gyepes-Johnson (Rog)-Kennedy; Burke-Rae-Ledley-Parry; Bothroyd-McCormack. Dave Jones continues to play silly buggers with his subs bench. Apart from no keeper, this time he chose 2 defenders and dropped the rather silly midweek choice of prospect Adam Matthews given it was a crucial game, dropped Scimeca and brought back McPhail and continues to ignore players like Quincy and Whittingham who can provide impact. So it was Comminges-Chopra-Johnson(Eddie)-McPhail-Purse this time.
Ipswich came to South Wales with little to play for stranded in 10th and too far away from play-off contention. When boss Jim Magilton was sacked on Wednesday and a coach with a comedy name of Bryan Klug was announced as caretaker, it seemed their season was over yet next day, they shocked the football world by announcing Roy Keane as manager. Keane announced he would watch from the Grandstand – becoming Ipswich boss was a novel way to blag a ticket for City’s last Ninian Park game – but ended up controlling affairs from the dugout.
They also had a formidable away record – the Championship’s third best – and in 2009 alone, Cardiff became their latest scalp to go with Crystal Palace, Barnsley, QPR and Reading.
Ipswich: Richard Wright, Balkestein-Bruce-Campo-Richards; Garvan-Norris-Peters- Giovani; Lisbie-Counago.
Anticipation was fantastic but build-up was suitably low key with so much on the line but a few stirring anthemic tunes took an already hot atmosphere a notch higher. Both sides came out accompanied by a couple of flag bearers, the Canton Standers were treated to those annoying inflated ‘clackers’ but the biggest blast of noise came as Ali called, “let’s make some noooooiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiisssssssssssssssseeeeeee”.
A humorous moment before kick-off as both sides ran to the Grange End goal to warm up, Cardiff sent Ipswich on their way to the Canton End, little did we know that we be the only battle we’d win all afternoon.
I’ll keep the report of the game brief partly because it was crap and mainly because it’s too painful to go into detail about. However Cardiff City started very brightly and had the crowd 150% behind them and nearly nicked a goal in the opening 30 seconds as a poor Alex Bruce back-pass saw Wright have to take on Bothroyd under tremendous pressure and scramble away, Wright quickly created more work and pressure for his keeper with a poor clearing header that dropped under the bar..
The place was rocking and City applied strong pressure, the one problem being they were guilty of overplay and too much football instead of just going for the jugular. Nice touches but rarely going anywhere it hurt The Tractor Boys and that included a succession of corners that were whipped in but City couldn’t get on the end of them although Ledley was unlucky to see an effort blocked.
However pressure eventually told as, 13 minutes in, Chris Burke beat his man again and swung a cross over that saw the veteran Ivan Campo take down Roger Johnson when the ball was easily clearing the two of them. A penalty without question.
City celebrated wildly and up stepped McCormack who was denied by Preston’s Lonergan last week and, horror of horrors, he was denied by an equally superb stop, if not better, yet he chose to place the ball in the same place as last week. McCormack has been rolling penalties into corners recently – only he will know why he’s suddenly changed to blasting them low but one thing I do know is that his head went and he faded badly from the game and when he had the ball, he was doing way too much and losing it time after time, his confidence shaken.
The warning signs were there for City as Ipswich were starting to look dangerous breaking forward with Giovani looking a real threat and giving Mark Kennedy, not for the first time recently, some real problems while City’s intensity had waned as moves broke down and passes went astray.
Bruce’s haphazard afternoon came to an end in agonising fashion just before the half hour as he tackled Ledley on the touchline and fell on his thumb either dislocating or breaking it. The Grandstand called out to him, Bruce looked up only to see most of Block F and Lower Grandstand giving him a thumbs up gesture!
Ipswich shuffled their pack and brought on the dangerous Jon Stead , another forward, which signalled their intent but City cranked it up another notch with Joe Ledley a fraction away connecting with a pass behind the defence as he set up a move and went on a terrific charge and the impressive Burke shot from 20 yards, Wright saved with his chest but City’s forwards just didn’t react.
10 minutes before the interval, it all started to unravel as Ipswich took the lead with a goal that underlined Cardiff’s inept defending of the past week. A simple ball over the top and – also not for the first time recently – Gabor Gyepes found himself not only out of position but wrong side of Stead, the former Blackburn and Spurs man bursting into the box and then cutting the ball back into the path of COUNAGO who swept home unchallenged from 12 yards. Far too simple.
Cardiff were affected and looked more lethargic and became more sloppy after that setback, the previously buoyant crowd became subdued as there was nothing for them to get behind although they tried to lift the side. Just before the interval, City almost levelled as an excellent Kennedy cross just failed to find Bothroyd but City had lost their way and it was concerning.
Half-Time: CITY 0 IPSWICH 1
Half-time saw Danny Malloy, City’s Captain when they were last in the top flight in 1960, do a lap of honour. Sprightly at 78, his movement and pace still looked a yard quicker than City’s laboured and torturous second half display which was little short of pathetic. Everything they’ve done well all season was completely absent.
I felt sure would come back with a response and fired up but they succeeded in getting even worse and the goal that put them two behind on 54 minutes was a shocker. Paul Parry was fed the ball and was one on one with an Ipswich defender running to the penalty area but he never looked like bursting past him for a moment and feel to the floor producing 20,000 groans. It got worse as Ipswich switched the ball downfield where Jon Stead was allowed to turn and shoot, get the ball back and lay it into the path of DAVID NORRIS who, just like Counago in the first half, had the luxury of firing home unchallenged, a good shot though but City’s play was shambolic.
There was a double sub for a ridiculous one. Off came McCormack for Chopra but then off came Paul Parry (to more than a few cheers) for McPhail. OK, the players brought off were misfiring but to my mind, the ones brought on (McPhail in particular) meant we were even less attack orientated in a game we were losing 2-0.
Cardiff became more and more fragmented, clueless, patternless and just a complete mess. They pushed forward but created nothing worth getting excited about other than a couple of flashed efforts across goal.
Eddie came on late for Gavin Rae and did make Wright produce a good stop but there was no way back, City even threw Roger Johnson up front but with players switched about all over the park, I didn’t know where they were supposed to be and what they were supposed to be doing. If I didn’t know better, I think the players felt that as well.
Taking risks and having no ideas, a third goal was always on the cards for the visitors and it came in added time. Another masterclass in defensive stupidity as Haynes’ 25 yard free-kick was tipped onto a post by the stretched Tom Heaton but as the ball rolled across his goal, City players were motionless and STEAD followed up to tap home for their third gift goal of the afternoon.
Boy, that was crap and there are immense worries. We don’t have a goalkeeper to feel confident about. Mark Kennedy is now being targeted by opposition sides for his lack of pace and is struggling badly in recent games. Gabor Gyepes has lost his way at present, how can someone so good and so consistent suddenly become so poor? Roger Johnson still doesn’t look right after his Crystal Palace trauma. Midfield is a mess with only Joe Ledley giving it everything although Chris Burke along with Kevin McNaughton were the only other players who can escape criticism. Up front, McCormack’s hot spell has passed and he’s at a low ebb, Chopra is struggling for fitness and Bothroyd was unbelievably poor today offering nothing in the box whatsoever. If it was a one-off, it could be understood but this is the third time in a horrendous week the story is the same.
A day that should have been one to remember really was another one to forget, especially as we were then made to wait 15 minutes for the end of Ninian Park fiesta that was a fiasco on a par with the match itself. The story has got to be different next week. To lose form is unfortunate, to let automatic promotion slip away is a cause of annoyance but to think we may now miss the play-offs would just be unforgiveable.
Photos can be found at:
http://nigelblues.blogspot.com/2009/04/cardiff-city-0-ipswich-town-3-in.html
