Thu Mar 21, 2013 3:59 pm
The thrill is gone
With the Bluebirds promotion push back on track following a thoroughly efficient display at struggling Sheffield Wednesday and the international break upon us, now’s a good time to reflect and to look forward.
First the good news. We are an amazing nine points clear of third place and with a game in hand. Thanks to Hull, Watford and Palace for all ‘doing a Cardiff’ last weekend, the victory at Hillsborough was even more valuable than anyone could have hoped for.
Nottingham Forest are fast on the heels of the nervous threesome and Messrs Bruce, Zola and Holloway may be more concerned about holding off the ever more serious challenge of Billy Davis’ resurgent team than in catching Malky Mackay’s Bluebirds. Only one of the long chasing promotion pack will take the second automatic promotion place and that is a huge pressure. A pressure Leicester could not manage.
Surely now, Cardiff can relax and play a more confident, open game than they have over the past few weeks? The Leicester game in particular was agony to watch with very little flair being shown by either team. The will not to lose was more evident, rather than a willingness to win. Even with players like Bellamy, Whittingham and Campbell on the home team and Dyer, Nugent and Wood on the visitors, mediocrity reigned supreme.
Last week I had the pleasure of watching Real Madrid at the magnificent Bernabau Stadium. They twice trailed lowly Mallorca only to sweep the minnows aside with a second half blast of four goals, three inside the first 12 minutes of the restart. The flair of players like Ronaldo, Higuain and Modric was too much for the visitors despite a creditable performance in which they displayed no little flair of their own.
This was not the Real Madrid that played Manchester United so tightly and was losing until that very debatable red card for Nani. Now La Liga is not the Football League Championship of course. Where Los Blancos can rely on their far greater talent, the gap between top and bottom in Spain is huge, there is no such gap in the Championship. If ever a division was more even from top to bottom than the Championship, it would be rare.
And thereby hangs the story of the league leaders Cardiff City. When Malky Mackay talks of a ‘monotonous consistency’ he isn’t joking. Cardiff are top because of consistency, grinding out wins, something Dave Jones’ teams could not do.
Peter Whittingham is the player who proves the point. What Peter Whittingham has become compared to what he was under Jones, is the difference between being top of the table and missing the boat. Whitts, Bothroyd and Chopra, Bellamy too, played with style and flair and at times were pretty to watch. They also folded like a deck chair on the Titanic. Mental strength and doing the grunt work deserted the teams of Dave Jones at crucial times.
No such soft under belly for Mackay’s team. It is difficult to remember a team playing at the top of the table and looking so dour, so lacking in imagination and afraid to take a risk. This possession style of keep ball is possession for a very cynical purpose. We keep the ball in a sideways, backward motion with our top player (Whittingham) so deep that he never looks like scoring despite his ability to do so. Dave Jones in his post-game criticism was right to talk about us looking for corners and throw-ins in the final third as a tactical plan. It’s a plan to keep the pressure on less than formidable Championship level players who will always make mistakes, switch off or simply be bettered by a Bellamy or a Campbell. There is no doubting our aerial threat from Hudson, Turner, Connolly, Helguson and young Nugent.
He who makes the least mistakes wins the game is the mantra of Cardiff City style soccer. And it works. If an opposing team defends without error, we can only hope for the flair of Bellamy and co to do something special, or Rude Gestede to head home. Even so they are not Ronaldo and co. Real Madrid can also play the numbers game, for that is what Cardiff plays. We play percentage football. The top teams must do it too when they face each other. The great player finds a way, the opponent makes a mistake or the ref blows a call. These are the ways the top teams win against one another. It’s the way Real beat United. Against Mallorca, their overwhelming skill is enough.
In a division as tight as the Championship and with so little difference between comparable teams, the percentages are even more important. Malky Mackay has done his homework and his arithmetic. It’s now a game of equations and analysis. To the winner go the spoils, Premier League football. Mackay has been better at it than everyone else. Don’t misunderstand me. I’m not criticising, I’m explaining.
When City fans dreamed of winning the Championship title in years past, did you, like me, see flair and imagination? In my dreams we took teams apart, we cut them to ribbons. Now I know these were dreams but you get the point. I didn’t dream of monotonous consistency.
As Championship level football turns from an art form to a science, Cardiff are leading the way but the thrill is gone, just look at Whitts. Can it return? Perhaps in the final games with promotion all but assured we will see some flair and a cutting edge from our best players. Maybe there is a three or four goal whipping ahead for someone, maybe even more than one. But don’t bank on it.
Let’s hope the rarefied air of the Premier League isn’t quite so monotonous. I have a feeling it can’t be.