Cardiff City 1-3 Middlesbrough: Boro outclass Bluebirds as Sabri Lamouchi's wait for first win continues
Cardiff City hosted Middlesbrough today with their Championship status looking increasingly rocky
By Glen Williams
Middlesbrough's Marcus Forss (right) celebrates scoring their side's first goal of the game (Image: Bradley Collyer/PA Wire.)
The wait goes on for Sabri Lamouchi to oversee his first Cardiff City victory as Middlesbrough inflicted a 3-1 win over the Bluebirds.
Boro were slick and clinical in the first half. Cardiff were desperate and helpless in the second.
Sory Kaba scored on his home debut, but only after Marcus Forss had handed the visitors a lead earlier in the first half. Cameron Archer's well-taken goal just before the break put Boro well in the driving seat.
Cardiff did well to show initiative in the second half, but Boro always looked threatening on the break and that proved to be the case when Riley McGree coolly slotted home the third in injury time.
That's 14 games in all competitions - 12 in the league - without a win and not a single point in the three games in which Lamouchi has been in charge. A late Wigan Athletic goal, against relegation rivals Huddersfield Town, is the only reason the Bluebirds are not in the relegation zone.
If you hadn't seen either of these sides play once this season, then the opening quarter of an hour was about as good a barometer you could have for how they were faring this season.
Middlesbrough looked a cut above. Cardiff clung on as Boro carved them open time and time again. In front of their home supporters, Cardiff had less than 20 percent of the ball inside the first 15 minutes.
So, then, it was no surprise when they took the lead. And with a typically stylish goal, too.
The opportunity presented itself to the visitors after some poor hold-up play from Kaba in the middle of the park which ceded possession. Riley McGree was released on the right and he drilled a low ball into the box, where it found Archer, whose cool lay-off presented Forss with an opportunity to strike. He showed a fleetness of foot to belt it past Ryan Allsop and into the roof of the net to hand the hosts the lead.
It looked as though Boro were in complete control, however, a moment of madness from Zack Steffen on 25 minutes saw the goalkeeper pass the ball to Callum Robinson high up the pitch. Robinson sprinted into the box and unselfishly squared the ball to evade the onrushing Steffen. Kaba could not have dreamed for an easier first goal as he tapped in unopposed from two yards out.
The Bluebirds then found their feet a little and gave as good as they got for 10 minutes or. In fact, that made it all the more frustrating when they conceded the second in such sloppy fashion.
Callum O'Dowda, uncharacteristically, it must be said, played an errant pass into the middle of the pitch and, suddenly, Cardiff looked vulnerable. Hayden Hackney played an inch-perfect pass around City's centre-backs and the lightning-quick Archer rounded Allsop before ramming it into the back of the net.
Back to the drawing board for Cardiff, because that felt like a real gut punch.
But in the end they were happy to go down the tunnel just one goal in arrears when the half-time whistle blew, because Forss almost had his second of the afternoon when he sent a header crashing into the Bluebirds' post just before the break.
Cardiff grew into things in the second half and had a couple of decent chances themselves.
Substitute Ryan Wintle plonked a lovely corner into the middle of the box and it looked for all the money in the world like Cedric Kipre would bury the header. But the big defender headed the ball into the floor so hard that it bounced agonisingly over the cross bar.
Just minutes later, another substitute, Andy Rinomhota, cracked a shot off from 30 yards but it whistled past the upright. It was better from Cardiff, but it just wasn't enough.
To their credit, Cardiff ended up looking like the better team for the last half an hour or so, but their painful Achilles' heel, not being able to create enough clear-cut opportunities, belied their effort once again.
It could have been more for Boro, too, because they hit the upright for a second time late on - when really they should have scored. A wicked cross was rolled across the box and it found Chuba Akpom at the far post. But, with an open goal in front of him, he inexplicably hit his effort against the upright.
But they would have time to add another, of course. Matt Crooks' cross, as the clock ticked into stoppage time, found McGree at the back post and he needed no second invitation to slot past Allsop.
The stadium emptied straight after, with seven minutes of injury time to play. Not the way Lamouchi would have envisaged his home debut in the dugout.
Cardiff City XI: Allsop; Romeo (Ng 70), McGuinness, Kipre, O'Dowda; Ralls (Rinomhota 57), Sawyers; Ojo (Wintle 57), Philogene (Davies 86), Robinson; Kaba (Etete 69).
Subs: Alnwick, Simpson.
Middlesbrough XI: Steffen; Smith, Lenihan, McNair, Giles, Howson, Hackney, Forss (Jones 69), McGree, Akpom (Crooks 89), Archer (Fry 79).
Subs: Roberts, Bola, Mowatt, Barlaser.
Attendance: 19,182
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