The City skipper was sent off seconds after City had taken a deserved lead as half time approached. The Bluebirds were easily the better team in the first 45 mins and could have had more to show than Neil Harris’ first City goal. The on loan Millwall man fired in from an acute angle to give City hope that the current poor form could be reversed.
Jobi McAnuff was dropped to allow Harris to start and Gabbidon was back in the side with Vidmar on the bench.
Peter Thorne had earlier seen his effort disallowed by one of the fussiest and most inconsistent referees I’ve seen for a while. His continual whistle blowing to penalise City players for the most innocuous of challenges was bordering on ridiculous. His bookings and sending off of Kavanagh was correct though, can’t blame him for Kav’s poor challenges, the second of which just after we had scored was so unnecessary.
Chris Barker was felled by a Derek Geary challenge that could have seen Barkers legs broken in two, he was quick to stand upto the Utd player who committed the foul and the referee deemed both worthy of a yellow card, I’ve seen players off for challenges like that, to book Barker as well was a slap in the face. To call the ref a cheat is not right, he was not cheating he was just incompetent.
City had played really well in the first 45 mins. The home crowd were silent and Utd looked to be there for the taking. The crowd woke up when Kav went off and so did their team. City fans fell silent in the first half to hear what noise was coming from the Blades fans. There was nothing, it was the quietest football ground I’ve been to in a very long time.
City started the second half on the back foot and stayed there for the rest of the match. It was wave on wave of Utd pressure and you just knew the inevitable would happen. Substitute Andy Liddell met Jon Harley’s cross to level the scores and Andy Gray scored the winner after a goalmouth scramble.
Tony Warner pulled of several good saves and James Collins I thought was the pick of the City defenders, in fact Collins was superb as he battled as if his life depended on it, but the 10 men could not stop the continual battering and any efforts towards Utd’s goal were very rare. The best of them from a Neil Harris shot that went over the bar, most of the play had stopped as Harris handled the ball but the referee missed it and the City player had a crack at goal but it went over.
From the moment Kav went off the game changed and there was only going to be one winner.
City cheered their team off, they played well in the first half, outplayed Utd for sure. If we had taken a better lead into the break maybe we could have come away with something but more importantly if Kav had kept his head we would have come away with something.
The Lennie out chants only came from a small section of the crowd and only late on. The finger of blame for this defeat is pointing at the City captain rather than the manager.
Still it’s a defeat and the chance to climb away from the bottom 3 was lost.
Next up it’s Wolves on Boxing Day.