Wed Aug 18, 2021 1:03 pm
The moment that changed the game
By Glen Williams
Wednesday 18th August 2021
The final 10 minutes of Tuesday night's match are almost a blur.
It was just wave after wave of Cardiff attacks. Where had this been for the previous 80 minutes?
Siriki Dembele, the scorer of Posh's second goal, was the best player on the pitch by a mile for most people's money.
He had to come off after 67 minutes owing to injury and that was a big blow to Peterborough, because he looked dangerous every time he got on the ball.
But, as Aden Flint points out, the sizeable unit of Jonson Clarke-Harris posed a massive threat to City's defence all evening.
He provided both assists for Peterborough and is one of the few people in this division who rival both Flint and Sean Morrison in the air.
He was hooked after 81 minutes and it proved a big move by Peterborough boss Darren Ferguson. It allowed Cardiff to mop up every clearance and hit back immediately. Flint could sail higher up the pitch with impunity and he netted his first immediately after Clarke-Harris' withdrawal.
Cardiff then mounted the pressure.
In the end, the hosts couldn't hang on and Flint, in the 96th minute, popped up with a powerful header at the back post to earn the point.
But Flint himself knows just how big a moment that was, when Clarke-Harris was taken off. He thinks it changed the course of the game.
"Fair play to Jonson Clarke-Harris, he's a big old unit," Flint said.
"He did give us a run for our money today. Whether we weren't at the races or not.
"But he played really well. Him going off gave us a chance to get back into it, because they didn't really have an outlet.
"It gave us a chance to get the ball down from the long goal kicks and the free-kicks and build play from there. That helped us get back into it."
Although, it must be said, Dillon Phillips' tremendous stoppage-time save on Burrows, with the score at 2-1, was absolutely vital.
Without that, there would be no Flint equaliser.