It was almost deja vu. Just like Saturday at Crewe, City fell behind. Just like every goal conceded this season and so many last season, it was caused by our defence collapsing. It was Coventry’s only serious on-goal attempt of the night. And more echoes of Crewe as City fought back hard to storm ahead through early second-half Earnie and Bullock goals. This time thankfully, Lennie didn’t tamper with his formation late on, the side showed steel and non-stop concentration and no late equaliser was gifted. Hallelujah! It was a hard fought but certainly deserved victory.
With a threadbare squad, a couple of players injured and the ‘will he, won’t he?’ signing of Sean Gregan now having a greater run than a West End play, Lennie picked the same starting line-up and sub’s bench as were on duty at the weekend. It wasn’t as if he was spoiled for choice. It was Margetson, Weston-Page-Gabbidon-Vidmar, Langley-Bullock-Kavanagh-Robinson, Lee and Earnie. The bench were Campbell, Collins, Croft, Parry and Warner.
The Sky Blues finished one place above City on goal difference last season after a strong second half to the season and two changes of manager. An injury hit Bluebirds recorded a superb 3-1 victory at Highfield Road in a game televised live on Sky but put on their worst display of the season, and several seasons before that, in a controversial 1-0 home loss in March. There must have been desire to avenge that result.
There is a renewed confidence about Coventry with the Monkey Man, Peter Reid, in charge. They finished last season strongly and opened the new campaign with a highly satisfying 2-0 home win over Sunderland. If Reidy was at Ninian Park, he must have had a touchline ban and been hiding in the Grandstand, his ’inchy’ assistant Adrian Heath was very much in charge at pitch side.
Our visitors are a strong blend of youth and experience that usually means strong, developing opponents. Their line-up formation may have been 4-4-2 but it often seemed like 8-1-1 as, like many more will, they came simply to suffocate and frustrate.
In goals was Scottish youth keeper Duncan Shearer as an assortment of experienced keepers have been linked, or even trained with the club. The back four were veteran 35 year old defender Richard Shaw (that old and still only one mini dreadlock hairstyle all his life!) and the now barrel-chested Steve Staunton, with Louis Carey freshly signed from the Wurzels this summer and home-grown Calum Davenport in central defence. Davenport, an England Under-21 international, tall, lean and blonde was easily their best player and probably best player on the pitch as he won header after header after header, the sort of commanding figure City have strived for.
Their midfield also had experience with another 35 year old, Tim Sherwood, accompanied by Bjorn Gudjohnsson (brother of the Chelsea striker), Stephen Hughes and the promising Michael Doyle. Their forwards are probably their weak link with Barrett and Johnson, “rejects” from Arsenal and Manchester United respectively.
With most of the country affected by storms and flash floods, only South Wales seems to have escaped over the past week. It was a sunny, warm day and a very muggy evening. The crowd was sizeable indeed, officially announced as 14,031 - many of the crowd announced “yeah, yeah, and the rest ”.
City opened strongly, carrying on with the performance seen second half at Crewe, as they powered towards the Canton Stand goal. In the opening minute, Earnie hit the post after being set up by a trademark Alan Lee run, his shot wasn’t cleanly hit and Shearer’s fingers tipped it onto the post and was lucky to see the rebound fall into his arms with Robbo set to pounce. Before 5 minutes had gone, Earnie was a fraction away from meeting a ball pinged across the area.
The Coventry goal and penalty area had a charmed life the entire first half. A series of shots, rebounds and ricochets always seemed to fall to a visiting player or to safety. The Sky Blues deserve credit though for their hard-working and disciplined play to frustrate City. They always got players behind the ball - sometimes their whole team, hunted in packs, threw bodies in the way, they made their luck.
The longer it progressed, you could feel a sense of frustration creeping along, on and off the pitch. Kav took every set piece, his free-kick delivery very good and always causing problems, his corner-kicks as poor as ever. Five first-half corners, two didn’t clear the first man - one of them never got above ankle height, two over hit but two caused problems. His best corner saw a frantic period of play where City got four shots on goal, each blocked by a Coventry defender.
City were in charge but Coventry, when they had the ball, moved it fast and tried to break but City were handling well. However they always give opponents a chance sooner or later and frustration turned to disaster in a style that only Cardiff City can.
Coventry got over halfway and launched a high ball goalwards from almost halfway near the Bob Bank touchline. There was no danger but, in City’s defence, obviously no communication as Danny Gabbidon nodded a routine header back to Margetson who was also coming out, the ball ran inches wide of post for a corner kick. And from that, a ball swung over at inviting height but striker BARRETT who left unmarked and unchallenged to deflect the ball home from close range. Criminal defending yet again, City’s third league goal conceded this season and every one given away by their own ineptitude.
It affected City and the crowd. The 400 Coventry fans were happy though chanting “We are the top of the league”. I remembered singing that with 5 minutes to go at Crewe last Saturday so was pleased that they lived to regret it too!
City, for the second game running, were denied a penalty as Weston, who had an excellent half and match, swung a ball over and a defender clearly used a hand pushing the ball away under challenge from John Robinson. Robbo and The Grandstand who saw it were incensed, the referee waved play on.
The confidence had gone out of City’s play, they looked ponderous. Earnie getting little or no service, midfield showing why they need a Gregan or someone of that ilk but there were more blocked efforts on goal.
Just to make things worse, City were once again being affected by incompetent officialdom with a linesman who had no concept of the offside rule flagging Earnie and Lee offside at least three times when they were clearly onside. The most bizarre had to be when Lee was given offside despite a Coventry player backing into him and another defender behind him.
Half-time: CITY 0 COVENTRY 1
The second half started as the first half had finished. City struggling once again to break down a packed defence, more inept flagging by a linesman and a referee who was poorer than poor too and rapidly losing control of the game as a result. It was going nowhere when, out of nothing, City levelled on 54 minutes with a cracking goal and just 7 minutes later, they turned the game on its head and went ahead.
Kav, who had a storming 2nd half and was central to City’s fightback, drove forward then intelligently chipped a ball behind the Coventry defence with spin to hold it up, John Robinson reacted first and looped the ball to the centre of goal and the wee fella EARNIE was there to twist in mid-air and turn the ball past the helpless Shearer. Earnie somersaulted, he didn’t take his shirt off but there was a sense that City had turned the corner.
With that, Coventry showed some desire to fight as Cardiff were now swarming them, they were cynical in stopping play and the game got very niggly but City showed controlled aggression and fought fire with fire, excellent to see. City ended up with four players booked - Kav, Robbo, Page and Langley - as players squared up and tackles flew in, Coventry only got one card
You could sense a second goal was coming and it arrived from a set piece of our own. City came out of defence and Kav switched play with a brilliant 50 yard diagonal ball to Robbo was immediately brought down 25 yards out. Kav took it and swung in the perfect cross for LEE BULLOCK to get there again and steer a header across Shearer from 10 yards. Ninian went mental, Bullock’s 4th goal in 6 games, an outstanding return for a midfielder.
The niggles continued, Langley squaring up to Steve Staunton, who earlier appeared to feign being elbowed on a 50/50 challenge to get him carded, getting the ref and linesman excited.
The final half-hour, the longer it went on, got tenser and tenser. City sought, but couldn’t quite find, the killer third goal and Coventry changed their line-up and formation to find their way back. To a man however, City were solid and resilient, toughing it out to victory in a way that will have pleased Lennie as it did with the crowd. Coventry, despite creating some pressure, were restricted to a mere handful of hopeful and hopeless long-distance efforts and flying very high or very wide to great cheers.
The defence appeared to have finally learned a lesson but maybe Lennie did also. He resisted what must have been his natural temptation to throw on extra defenders and create a 5 man defence which appears to confuse the defenders and invite the opposition onto them. Well done to both for showing courage, it paid off.
City had late chances. Andy Campbell replaced Earnie late on, one typical selection Lennie stuck with, and raced away with his first touch but lost control. Best moment came when Alan Lee again powered down the touchline, brushed aside a challenge inside the area and cut the ball back to Richard Langley 10 yards out but he got his feet tangled and managed to scoop the ball over the Grange End and out of the goal.
Emotions were still running high. The spare balls to keep play moving around the pitch seemed to disappear which annoyed Adrian Heath and when a City fan in the Lower Grandstand threw the ball towards the dug outs rather than a Cov player in front of him, Inchy shouted abuse and seemed to want a fight himself. Very funny.
The ref put his whistle in his mouth for the last time, the Coventry fans disappeared out of the ground before he finished blowing it - what a lovely sight, hope to see that many more times this season. City had a standing ovation, the ref and his linesman had an escort away.
It wasn’t classic football. Our defence have hopefully turned a corner. Weston and Vidmar were excellent but Robert Page, despite some vital late touches, looks ponderous and is taking his time to settle. The midfield still doesn’t look right but we’ll always score goals as our record shows. It was however the way that City fought back and showed the balls to close out the game that everyone should salute.
The win put City in 3rd and above Leeds United - sweet, sweet, and sweet.
PA. report
Cardiff mounted a stirring second-half fightback as they came from behind to beat Coventry 2-1 at Ninian Park.
Graham Barrett's opener just before the half hour earned the visitors a narrow half-time advantage, but Cardiff emerged from the interval in positive fashion to score two goals in seven minutes.
Coventry's display before Barrett struck suggested manager Peter Reid was fortunate to miss the match through illness, but they played much the better football thereafter, and few could complain at the interval scoreline.
Cardiff rallied towards the end of the first half, and carried their new-found fluency into a second period which saw them overturn the advantage with some aplomb.
Robert Earnshaw scored at the second attempt after being fed by John Robinson in the 54th minute, and Bullock enhanced his claims for a regular starting place with a well-taken second just after the hour.
Though not lacking in endeavour, Coventry struggled to break down a resilient Cardiff rearguard, and the equaliser they sought proved elusive as the hosts added to their opening-day draw with three deserved points.
The highlight of the early exchanges was Earnshaw's effort, which came back off the inside of the Coventry post and into the hands of a grateful Scott Shearer.
Alan Lee, the scorer of Cardiff's second goal in Saturday's 2-2 draw with Crewe and the provider for Earnshaw in the second minute, did as much as anyone to break the deadlock.
Though Coventry, 2-0 victors over Sunderland at the weekend, began to find their composure, they created little in the way of clear-cut chances.
Richard Langley saw a left-footed strike cleared by Steve Staunton at the other end of the pitch, but Cardiff's tendency to give the ball away carelessly cost them several opportunities to translate their dominance into goals.
Coventry punished them in emphatic fashion, Barrett finding himself unmarked as he attacked the near post to nod home Bjarni Gudjonsson's left-wing corner.
Robinson forced a smart stop from Shearer as Cardiff mounted a late first-half revival, but Coventry hung on until half-time.
The goal Cardiff threatened before the interval arrived within nine minutes of the restart, with Graham Kavanagh and Robinson combining before finding Earnshaw.
The Wales international's shot came back off Shearer, but Earnshaw showed his predatory instincts by converting the rebound from close range.
Cardiff's pressure yielded another goal in the 61st minute, Bullock rising well to convert Kavanagh's precise free-kick, awarded for Stephen Hughes' foul on Robinson.
Michael Doyle stung Martyn Margetson's palms as Coventry battled back, but Tim Sherwood and Hughes could not find the target from distance.
Doyle wasted a decent opening for Coventry, while Langley, profiting from good work from Lee, drilled a shot over the crossbar in the final minute.
External reports
Coventry Official Website
Western Mail