Monday 5 November 2012

Bluebirds look forward to three easy points

Cardiff City have lost their last four matches away, but tomorrow night they go to Charlton Athletic where they hope to claim three easy points: Bluebirds

This might seem realistic given that, as another blogger has pointed out, Charlton's home record would place them in the bottom two while their away record would put them in the top ten.

'Where has it all gone wrong at home?' tweets Richard 'Creepy' Crawley, inviting Charlton fans to send in their moans and groans to Pravda.

The usual suspects have come up with their answer: Chris Powell. The most extreme view is that Powell has one game left, but others argue that whilst he could cut it in League 1, he is not up to the challenges of the Championship and unless he is sacked, relegation looms. As usual, no apparent saviour is on offer.

I would accept the argument that Sir Chris made mistakes in his team selection last Saturday. A 4-5-1 formation would have been better, particularly with Bradley Wright-Phillips clearly lacking confidence. But even Sir Alex Ferguson makes mistakes sometimes.

We are about where I expected to be at this stage of the season (I have the only accurate points forecast at the moment on CAFCPicks). However, I have always thought that the team needed one or two more quality players to make it truly competitive, not least in central midfield.

Our problems have been compounded by injuries. The latest one is to Wilson, who as Drinking During the Game has pointed out was originally nominated as scapegoat of the year, but has really improved since he came to The Valley.

Despite our injury problems, and the undoubted strength of promotion contenders Cardiff City, I do not think that Tuesday night's game is a foregone conclusion. Otherwise I wouldn't make the journey down to London with a return home on Wednesday morning. And, even if we lose, I hope Chris Powell stays.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Saturday , late 2nd half was as poor as I've seen since the later period of Parkinson. But there is one place blame should be placed, the Board.
Not strengthening in the summer was a huge gamble. An injury crisis would always have exposed the squad.
The solution now is to get in someone like Derry from QPR to add some experience and aggression centrally that would give to base to allow a 442 at home. Andy Hughes would be an option if fit.

Anonymous said...

Saturday was a field day for 'the bloke behind me, an all time classic was we should get Warnock in or Wise....... He clearly had a name beginning with W too


KEEP CALM
AND TRUST
IN
POWELL

Anonymous said...

Will be interesting to see if Cardiff's change strip is blue! One thing I hope is that Sir C does not experiment with 3 at the back, or, for the last ten minutes last Saturday, 2 at the back, Stephens supposedly being one of the 3. With Taylor on the bench surely there was an alternative? Nothing wrong with subbing a sub. Perhaps CP thought that with half Boro's first-choice eleven missing we would surge to victory. They were a bit shrewder, hitting the ball over our midline into a sparsely defended area, gifted two goals by a formation to which our players could not adapt.

As the first contributor says, it was a bit Parkinsonian, but way, way off the time when anyone should think of turning to a change of manager. There is enough uncertainty about the overall situation; players' agents will be on their phones to other potential employers if a change is made in team management.