Cardiff Post-Match Thread

[i'm leicester til i die]

Cardiff fan here.

I just want to say that I thought the game today was really balanced. It could have gone either way and you're unlucky not to have scored. I didn't think we'd win at your place but I have said since the last day of the season that I'm certain Cardiff will beat Leicester back in Wales.

That's no disrespect to Leicester, though. After all, you've got this far and you only came back up this season. It's taken us a good few years and it's been fecking frustrating.

From a Cardiff perspective though, I think there's a real determination in our team and that comes from the screw-up we suffered last year.

After reading through a few pages I read some of you think your tactics were a bit wayward. I think the only way you would have beaten us today is if you'd been more agressive from the start, and put the ball into the box more often - you had a good few set peices as well and you really had some other good chances - Fryatt for example - on another day, you would have won. If you'd tried to beat our defence for pace, that doesn't always work because even though we're not the quickest, Hudson and Kennedy are very good at covering the space which makes it hard for teams to create good chances.

If you don't get through to the final though don't be too disheartened because your team will be up there next season too if you keep hold of your squad. See you in Cardiff on Wednesday!

i think he was very respectable, and most of it is true, who would of thought that we would be in the play-offs after being promoted. HONESTLY, if someone said at the beginning of the season we would be in the position we are in now, you would have told them where to put it, wouldn't you

[AndyBrew]

Also, how embarrassing we couldn't sell out for play off semi final. I understand people saved their money incase we got to Wembley and it was on tele but still.

we normally go to the games as a family of 5 but I could only buy 2 tickets via the website hence my wife didn't fancy sitting elsewhere, and then to see empty seats everywhere and the club bangs on about being family orientated, idiots!

[Rocky Dennis]

Cardiff fan here.

I just want to say that I thought the game today was really balanced. It could have gone either way and you're unlucky not to have scored. I didn't think we'd win at your place but I have said since the last day of the season that I'm certain Cardiff will beat Leicester back in Wales.

That's no disrespect to Leicester, though. After all, you've got this far and you only came back up this season. It's taken us a good few years and it's been fecking frustrating.

From a Cardiff perspective though, I think there's a real determination in our team and that comes from the screw-up we suffered last year.

After reading through a few pages I read some of you think your tactics were a bit wayward. I think the only way you would have beaten us today is if you'd been more agressive from the start, and put the ball into the box more often - you had a good few set peices as well and you really had some other good chances - Fryatt for example - on another day, you would have won. If you'd tried to beat our defence for pace, that doesn't always work because even though we're not the quickest, Hudson and Kennedy are very good at covering the space which makes it hard for teams to create good chances.

If you don't get through to the final though don't be too disheartened because your team will be up there next season too if you keep hold of your squad. See you in Cardiff on Wednesday!

A decent post.

I doubt many Foxes fans would honestly say you didnt deserve the win.

I wonder what your thoughts are on the Gamesmanship (cheating) that goes on in your team?

Bothroyd should have been sent off, he must have committed at least 10 fouls, a deliberate elbow, a shirt pull and falling over when anyone went near him! He's a disgrace and its easy to see why he's never made it at a bigger club! The ref was extremely lenient with him dont you think?

Same for McPhail, just there to get our players sent off wasnt he???

The same happened in the league game here.

I think you're a good team and deserved to win, if you go through I'll want the other team to beat you at Wembley due to the above!

The Premier League ref has done you a big favour today, got 3 key decisions terribly wrong, I hope but doubt we will get such luck at your place??

[lavrentis]

Even stuff which only a free kick being the difference.

All to play for yet, 2-0 in Wales please.

[dan411]

That's exactly the kind of overconfidence that loses two legged ties - so carry on!

Well you can put a case forward for ether side:

For Cardiff:

1 ] We have never lost a game at night time at our new stadium.

2 ] We have already beaten you twice there this season.

a) Once was with ten men (you may recall Gabor Gyepes' superb rugby tackle on James Vaughan ) - though to be honest, it's sort of understandable that some label us a dirty team when things like that happen.

b) The other was a comeback from 2-1 down - so if you do score the first goal on Wednesday, it's not a guarantee that the momentum isn't going to swing back at some point.

For Leicester:

1 ] This is a big point - if you play Steve Howard, the Cardiff defence isn't going to have a comfortable night, I think everyone would agree with that. He has a nasty habit of scoring against us, not just for you but for his former teams - if memory serves well I think we tried to sign him at one point ourselves.

2 ] N'Guessan also has a habit of scoring against Welsh clubs. If you play him and Howard up front then you're likely to score at least one.

3 ] When Cardiff played Stoke in the Division 2 play offs a month of Sundays ago, we won the away tie... but lost the home tie and didn't make the final.

I do think whoever wins through in the end will have done it because they could cope with the pressure. You may say I'm overconfident, but we have shown against Leicester this season we don't crack under pressure, and this is why I think we'll win on Wednesday. Still, I guess we can speculate all we want, it's all down to 90 minutes of football in a few days time.

[Shane]

you think whittingham would of scored from where the foul was commited, as shown above? NO CHANCE!

[dan411]

A decent post.

I doubt many Foxes fans would honestly say you didnt deserve the win.

I wonder what your thoughts are on the Gamesmanship (cheating) that goes on in your team?

Bothroyd should have been sent off, he must have committed at least 10 fouls, a deliberate elbow, a shirt pull and falling over when anyone went near him! He's a disgrace and its easy to see why he's never made it at a bigger club! The ref was extremely lenient with him dont you think?

Same for McPhail, just there to get our players sent off wasnt he???

The same happened in the league game here.

I think you're a good team and deserved to win, if you go through I'll want the other team to beat you at Wembley due to the above!

The Premier League ref has done you a big favour today, got 3 key decisions terribly wrong, I hope but doubt we will get such luck at your place??

Well, for a start, any team with Jay Bothroyd and Michael Chopra are never going to win any fair play awards. Bothroyd is a talented striker, but our tactics often see us play long balls up to him and as such, he has to put himself around a lot - which results elbows, pushing, all sorts of things. Conversely, he's also one of the most fouled players in our league. He spends half of his time on the grass!

I will admit I had my heart in my mouth watching him today, especially in the second half. You'd have thought he'd be more careful after the booking; I saw him dive at one point (like you say, he was unchallenged) and I was confused why the ref didn't book him again, they are the rules. A massive relief for us though, he's one of our key players.

As for the three penalty shouts Leicester had, I don't think any of them were completely deliberate, the officials probably saw it as ball to hand, although I thought the third one looked very dubious. Cardiff are a lucky team. Strangely we ourselves have been awared a ton of penalties this season and I don't remember many being given against us. On another day, with a different ref, they would have been given. It is hard for me to say but I think if one had been awarded before we scored the goal, you may have gone on to win the first leg.

Like I said in the other post about the Gyepes rugby tackle in the last game you played against us, some of it is just brutal or blatant, it doesn't win us a lot of fans, and I can see how we won't have a lot of neutrals on our side if we make the final! Then there's the whole 'Welsh team in the top English division thing,' which might increase that feeling, it's almost as if this team have a "win by any means necessary" attitude instilled into them.

[Ozwin]

you think whittingham would of scored from where the foul was commited, as shown above? NO CHANCE!

Traoré would have eh?

[Fosse Fox]

Well you can put a case forward for ether side:

For Cardiff:

1 ] We have never lost a game at night time at our new stadium.

2 ] We have already beaten you twice there this season.

a) Once was with ten men (you may recall Gabor Gyepes' superb rugby tackle on James Vaughan ) - though to be honest, it's sort of understandable that some label us a dirty team when things like that happen.

b) The other was a comeback from 2-1 down - so if you do score the first goal on Wednesday, it's not a guarantee that the momentum isn't going to swing back at some point.

For Leicester:

1 ] This is a big point - if you play Steve Howard, the Cardiff defence isn't going to have a comfortable night, I think everyone would agree with that. He has a nasty habit of scoring against us, not just for you but for his former teams - if memory serves well I think we tried to sign him at one point ourselves.

2 ] N'Guessan also has a habit of scoring against Welsh clubs. If you play him and Howard up front then you're likely to score at least one.

3 ] When Cardiff played Stoke in the Division 2 play offs a month of Sundays ago, we won the away tie... but lost the home tie and didn't make the final.

I do think whoever wins through in the end will have done it because they could cope with the pressure. You may say I'm overconfident, but we have shown against Leicester this season we don't crack under pressure, and this is why I think we'll win on Wednesday. Still, I guess we can speculate all we want, it's all down to 90 minutes of football in a few days time.

A Vaughan Fry-up for me... Both, for different reasons, will be very motivated to get on the score sheet (don't you think Matty's one-on-one whimp out was so Owenesque?). Howard and Waghorn as back up (both lack a cutting edge). Dyer may also atone...

Unfortunately for us bully boy Bothroyd may like a wander behind our high defensive line...

[Tilley]

Traoré would have eh?

:laugh:

I remember Shane's Traore fascination.

[Shane]

this is no time for jokes about armand traore!!!

i can see it now on wednesday, wayne brown comes running on the pitch on his crutches and headbutts whittingham in the face

[Rocky Dennis]

Well, for a start, any team with Jay Bothroyd and Michael Chopra are never going to win any fair play awards. Bothroyd is a talented striker, but our tactics often see us play long balls up to him and as such, he has to put himself around a lot - which results elbows, pushing, all sorts of things. Conversely, he's also one of the most fouled players in our league. He spends half of his time on the grass!

I will admit I had my heart in my mouth watching him today, especially in the second half. You'd have thought he'd be more careful after the booking; I saw him dive at one point (like you say, he was unchallenged) and I was confused why the ref didn't book him again, they are the rules. A massive relief for us though, he's one of our key players.

As for the three penalty shouts Leicester had, I don't think any of them were completely deliberate, the officials probably saw it as ball to hand, although I thought the third one looked very dubious. Cardiff are a lucky team. Strangely we ourselves have been awared a ton of penalties this season and I don't remember many being given against us. On another day, with a different ref, they would have been given. It is hard for me to say but I think if one had been awarded before we scored the goal, you may have gone on to win the first leg.

Like I said in the other post about the Gyepes rugby tackle in the last game you played against us, some of it is just brutal or blatant, it doesn't win us a lot of fans, and I can see how we won't have a lot of neutrals on our side if we make the final! Then there's the whole 'Welsh team in the top English division thing,' which might increase that feeling, it's almost as if this team have a "win by any means necessary" attitude instilled into them.

Thing is, its rare that handballs are truly deliberate and difficult to prove, even the very obvious ones dont always get punished.

The ball struck your players hand but his hand shouldnt have been there, im 100% certain if that was anywhere else on the pitch it would be a Leicester free kick, I beleive that Wiley simply did not want to make what might be considered a 'big' decision!

Hence, no penalty, no red card for Bothroyd, you'd like to thik that Prem Referees are bigger than that but clearly not in this case!

[Manderic's pants]

you think whittingham would of scored from where the foul was commited, as shown above? NO CHANCE!

GRRRRRRRR....

[Shane]

GRRRRRRRR....

[Ashley]

Just remember boys, its only half time and a long one at that.

[Lisburn Fox]

Left it a while to post, just to ensure I didn't knee jerk about todays disappointing performance overall. Thought we looked a bit tired and void of ideas until the desperation of the last 15 minutes. On the plus side we are only 1 goal behind and providing we apply ourselves on Wednesday we will get that back in the first half. I think Cardiff fans will get on their backs and we can take advantage of that. I know it's an old cliche but we must not go down wondering on Wednesday (we must not go down at all).

Yes we should have had a penalty, yes he did move the free kick, yes Fryatt should have scored, They did hit the post and the Bar and only a desperate tackle from Bruce and supberb covering from Hobbs kept it to one.

So can we do it - Yes

Will we do it - I really don't know

I hope Morrison is back,

Weale

Morrison

Hobbs

Brown

Berner

Dyer

King

Wellans

Gallagher

Howard

Waghorn

Subs: Logan, Fryatt, Bruce, Spearing, Salano, N'Guesson, Kermorgant.

Wednesday is a BLUE day/night either way.

[carterfox90]

poor poor poor & that was just the ref & even our hero couldnt score 1 on 1 but saying that he's not great at them when he's fit absolutly gutted bad tactics we will have to play the best we have played all season to get through now they will try to finish us off within the first 15 mins on weds but we've had a great season just a shame NP got it wrong today

[MC Prussian]

Unbelievable how biased SkySports are towards all Leicester opposition. First the Newcastle love-fest and now only Cardiff, Cardiff, Cardiff in the highlights program.

Funny how it gives the ordinary viewer a totally wrong picture of how things went at the Walkers - they omitted all our corners and free-kicks of the first half.

[Bugg]

Unbelievable how biased SkySports are towards all Leicester opposition. First the Newcastle love-fest and now only Cardiff, Cardiff, Cardiff in the highlights program.

Funny how it gives the ordinary viewer a totally wrong picture of how things went at the Walkers - they omitted all our corners and free-kicks of the first half.

Yeah, and on the final score programme on the beeb, the pundit at the game said that Cardiff dominated all game, when they really didn't. What do you expect, people are still bitter that we didn't get a points deduction when we went into administration

[BoneDog]

Just got back, was it me or was the wall for their goal in totally the wrong place? What were the penalty appeals like? Ewan Roberts said on RL that there was a definite pen but I couldn't really tell.

There wasn't a wall ! Only Matt Fryatt standing there on his own, I was fumin. If we weren't having a wall we should of at least had a man on the post. Ridiculously sloppy goal to give away.

A one man wall for a free-kick in that position

[CKB]

Not jumping on any bandwagon but was abit confuzzled in the team selection today, thought Morrison was fit??? maybe he ain't and no Vaughan or Brown? both unfit i assume?? Brown wasn't a miss but Vaughan with his pace could have helped us

It's not over but Cardiff started as favs and now really are favs (make sense?)

We didn't deserve to lose imo and we didn't deserve to win either, yes they played the better football but we had a few decent chances and a few very iffy decisions went against us which should have resulted in us at least getting a draw and Fryatt's miss? well unfit/coming back/whatever....come on??? it was shocking i could have had dinner, tea, a drink, some cake and still put that away!

So now to Wednesday....more forward thinking needed but gotta be cautious aswell as it could be risky but lets just see what happens. First goal could be cruicial, goes to them it's over imo, goes to us then hold on tight people it's gonna be a bumpy ride!

[BoneDog]

I think Chris Weale will be disappointed to be beaten from that far out, but not seen the highlights so don't know how good the freekick was.

It was routine and most of us would of scored it in my opinion. Basically it was an open goal. Just like practicing free-kicks up the park without a wall to get over (or a keeper in the way).

It was a gift I still can't get me head round it.

[filbertway]

There wasn't a wall ! Only Matt Fryatt standing there on his own, I was fumin. If we weren't having a wall we should of at least had a man on the post. Ridiculously sloppy goal to give away.

A one man wall for a free-kick in that position

Although I agree we needed either more of a wall or weale to take a more central position, a man on the post would have been suicidal as their players would have had the freedom of the box.

Edited to say, to be fair to whittingham it was a great strike so you cant take anything away from him.

[bluebirdfoxtalk]

Tactics were not great today. Long balls to Waghorn who was isolated. Passing wasn't the best either. Never really thought we'd score, but I thought the defending was top notch.

2-0 against Cardiff is a big ask, I hope we can do it!

yes, i ve never been on this board - was interested to see what you people thought. quite surprised at lots of common sense here (well at least as common as posiible under the circumstances). i thought ccfc shaded lots of the game but one goal ahead doesn t mean much in a game like that so a draw was always definitely possible. as for the pens, i (obviously) thought that they would have been harsh - mcnaughton s especially as he was whirling around in the box - look at the replay, he had no idea where the ball was. i thought that the sky commentators got that wrong, they also didn t give your goalie credit either when he saved bothroyd s header.

you were being bullied up front and some help was needed there and i was surprised that changes weren t made earlier. i can only guess that pearson tought that he didn t have anybody on the bench that he could use. you could have used howard to add a bit of biff up front as well. this ll change with howard available for the next match but i wonder if dave jones will start with two big CBs if so.

i hope the next match will be as good as this one. incidentally, you need only score one at ccs to have a chance, a thought that raises me 1/2 an inch off the chair as i type.

a complete aside:

while i was watching the game, i got annoyed as i couldn t remember the name of somebody that was on match of the day years ago. "Oh yes the ypoungster!" i think a vey excited barry davies shouted. you had a player in the team as keith weller (a great player) was injured and this player scored two. he was called joe something? it was in the fa cup but i can t remember aginst who. and i think he went to grimsby after. yes, i suppose that i could google it but i do try to work the grey matter. i will until somebody replies.

[davieG]

yes, i ve never been on this board - was interested to see what you people thought. quite surprised at lots of common sense here (well at least as common as posiible under the circumstances). i thought ccfc shaded lots of the game but one goal ahead doesn t mean much in a game like that so a draw was always definitely possible. as for the pens, i (obviously) thought that they would have been harsh - mcnaughton s especially as he was whirling around in the box - look at the replay, he had no idea where the ball was. i thought that the sky commentators got that wrong, they also didn t give your goalie credit either when he saved bothroyd s header.

you were being bullied up front and some help was needed there and i was surprised that changes weren t made earlier. i can only guess that pearson tought that he didn t have anybody on the bench that he could use. you could have used howard to add a bit of biff up front as well. this ll change with howard available for the next match but i wonder if dave jones will start with two big CBs if so.

i hope the next match will be as good as this one. incidentally, you need only score one at ccs to have a chance, a thought that raises me 1/2 an inch off the chair as i type.

a complete aside:

while i was watching the game, i got annoyed as i couldn t remember the name of somebody that was on match of the day years ago. "Oh yes the ypoungster!" i think a vey excited barry davies shouted. you had a player in the team as keith weller (a great player) was injured and this player scored two. he was called joe something? it was in the fa cup but i can t remember aginst who. and i think he went to grimsby after. yes, i suppose that i could google it but i do try to work the grey matter. i will until somebody replies.

It was Joe Waters against QPR if I remember correctly - just found it:

http://video.google....23991181665654#

http://video.google....23991181665654#