" Malky needs to grind City's rivals in to the dust"

Paul Abbandonato: 'Malky Mackay wants to grind Cardiff City's rivals into the dust'
11 Apr 2013

Media Wales' Head of Sport Paul Abbandonato has his say on Malky Mackay's conservative approach at Cardiff City.


Should Malky Mackay show more swagger?

Sometimes I find myself wishing that Malky Mackay would have just a little more swagger about him when it comes to his Bluebirds reaching the Premier League.

Less of this ‘we’ll keep on taking one game at a time’ and cautious Malky-speak of ‘monotonous consistency’ and more of ‘we’re on the brink of achieving something very special and magical here.’

Then we get events like Tuesday night at Cardiff City Stadium to underline just why Mackay has been absolutely 100 per cent right in adopting his conservative approach.

The moment you begin to take anything for granted in the Championship, you get stung. Just witness Stephen Foster, Barnsley, last minute as evidence of that.

Mackay, with his experience of managing Cardiff and Watford at this level, knows it more than anyone. Hence his pragmatic, rather than swashbuckling, approach to the last few weeks as the Bluebirds’ promotion dream has drawn closer and closer.

Before the champagne is even purchased by the Bluebirds, let alone put on ice, Mackay wants to grind City’s main rivals into the dust.

Chalk off the matches and increase the Bluebirds’ points tally until it is mathematically impossible for them to be overtaken in the top two.

A moment will arrive soon when that scenario becomes reality and Malky’s shackles will be released.

But Foster’s last-gasp equaliser for Barnsley the other night ended any hope of that happening this weekend when City meet Nottingham Forest.

I guess that unexpected Barnsley goal summed up the topsy-turvy nature of this Championship and reinforced Mackay’s belief that it really does need to be a case of focus on the game in front of you and no further ahead than that.

To that end, it was another point gained, taking the Bluebirds to the 80 mark and bringing that Premier League fairytale even closer to reality.



That is the glass half-full argument.

The glass half-empty viewpoint would be that the Bluebirds really should have secured three points and to blame referee Fred Graham for playing too much injury-time is a futile argument.

Personally, I think Barnsley were woeful, lacking even one good player and I can’t get my head around how they have had such decent results against the leading teams in recent times.

Their commitment is there in abundance, but their quality is severely lacking and a team of City’s ability really should have blown them away.

That they didn’t was down to the Bluebirds sitting too deep the moment they went a goal up, trying to protect what they had, but in doing so inviting Barnsley pressure for the first time in the match.

Very difficult to argue with this and that's going some for a Media Wales correspondent

As the song from Les Miserables goes: "One more day..."

The game by game approach is the best way to go about it, that way you will only be focused on the one game without getting others playing on your mind.

How many times has this approach backfired on us? It so nearly worked but that last 4 seconds may as-well have been 40 minutes because it didn't!

There is a simple lesson here and it is........

IF ITS NOT BROKE DONT TRY TO FIX IT!