FA Cup 3rd round day. One of the biggest football days of the season. David's v Goliath's. Or in this case Cardiff City v Carlisle United. Separated by around 300 miles and 50 or so league places, it should have been a walk in the spork for City, especially given Neil Harris, the City manager's resolve to bounce back after a 6-1 hammering by QPR on New Year's Day. But this is Cardiff City, and things never, ever go to plan. There were multiple changes to the squad as expected, but it was still a decent XI on paper. City appeared to be denied a penalty by the inconsistent referee within the first few minutes, only to concede a penalty themselves 11 minutes in, which was scored on the rebound after 'keeper Smithies saved the original shot.
City were all over the place, and chants by the decent number of travelling fans of "You're fucking shit" couldn't really be argued with. In fairness to the visiting fans, that wasn't the only song they had, and the predictable "Championship - you're having a laugh" and renditions of God Save The Queen were wheeled out, and they did their best to create some sort of atmosphere. With less than 5,300 fans in total, and the Grange, Grandstand and Canton stands closed there was never going to be any atmosphere from the City faithful.
But back to the football - if you can call it that. A Premier League side only last season, Cardiff's stock plan seems to be pass sideways, sideways, sideways, then back and hoof long. Come to think of it, that was our plan in the Premier League too. There's no visible plan, let alone a plan B. There's little quality on or with the ball, and a lack of composure and urgency right round the team. City had a fair bit of the ball, but could do nothing with it. Carlisle compounded City's woes by going 2-0 up on the stroke of half time, and the Bluebirds were roundly booed off at the break.
Manager Neil Harris said after the game there was no ranting at half time (there bloody well should have been), but City did come out of the blocks after the break for 10 minutes at least, pulling back a goal through Callum Paterson and then equalising via a Gavin Whyte header (despite a suspicion that the ball had gone out of play before he scored), but any glimmering hopes of a City comeback win faded as they reverted to type and despite a (slightly) better second period, they failed to break down the visitors defence. Indeed, Carlisle had a couple of late chances to nick it, and whilst that might have objectively been harsh, you wouldn't have been surprised had they done so.
There were less boos at full time, but a hugely disappointing afternoon following on from the QPR game and the prospect of an unwanted long distance midweek replay beckons, but I suppose at least we're still "in the hat" for the 4th round.
More worryingly, the next home game is the fabled South Wales derby, with our friends from down west hoping to do the league double over us. On this form, who'd bet against it? Not me.
No comments:
Post a Comment