Powerade-quaffing surrender monkeys

By: Martyn | April 27th, 2009

A couple of New Jersey hunters are out in the woods when one of them falls to the ground. He doesn’t seem to be breathing, his eyes are rolled back in his head. The other guy whips out his cell phone and calls the emergency services. He gasps to the operator: “My friend is dead! What can I do?” The operator, in a calm soothing voice says: “Just take it easy. I can help. First, let’s make sure he’s dead.” There is a silence, then a shot is heard. The guy’s voice comes back on the line. He says: “OK, now what?”
This Spike Milligan effort has been hailed in some quarters as the funniest joke ever. However, said joke is now beginning to experience squeaky-bum time on that lavish throne of hers with Cardiff City’s end-of-season form threatening to climax with one of the worst capitulations/best punch-lines in the history of jokes/the club (there is a certain collapse in the history of Dave Jones the manager to challenge it mind you…) and rightfully assume the crown of funniest joke ever. The Pope (see above) clearly didn’t bless Ninian Park well enough…

After needing merely a point to ice the cake of a season’s good work, the Bluebirds have proceeded to run down Tesco Metro on several occasions only to come back with everything but the sweet solidified sugar:

Preston North End 6 – 0 Cardiff City
24th placed, really not very good and relegated already Charlton Athletic 2 – 2 Cardiff City
Cardiff City 0 – 3 Ipswich Town

P3 W0 D1 (just, and undeservedly) L2 F2 A11 (2 PK’s won, 2 McCormack PK’s saved)

Why is that some of the players have decided to play in such an abject and non-bothered manner all of a sudden?! Fatigue? Lack of belief? Maybe’s. However, what is certain is that more than a handful will not be in contention for a first team spot should we reach

The Promised Land (TM)

Here is a list of the players on our books who have played a relevant part or featured on the bench this season. The players in bold will remain in the first team/squad should we gain promotion (I base this on us having any hope of staying in that blasted top division). Those who remain in plain characters would be tossed aside or left to work on their golf handicap:

HYPOTHETICAL PREMIER LEAGUE SQUAD (Italics indicate that the player is on loan at present)

- Tom Heaton (on a loan deal but one, alas, likely to be made permanent)
- Peter Enckelman (would challenge Heaton for the no. 1 jersey)
- Dimitrios Konstantopoulos (already deemed surplus to requirements)
- Stuart Taylor (will return to Villa at the end of the season)
- Erwin Sak (the youngster would be retained as third choice but won’t feature)
- Kevin McNaughton (first-team player)
- Miguel Comminges (would or should be sold)
- Tony Capaldi (likely to be sold or released)
- Riccy Scimeca (sold or released)
- Darren Purse (sold)
- Roger Johnson (first-team player)
- Gabor Gyepes (substitute CB one would imagine, but his lack of pace won’t help him should he get on)
- Mark Kennedy (released)
- Gavin Rae (reserve player or sold, hopefully)
- Stephen McPhail (a Jones favourite so probably first-team player)
- Joe Ledley (first-team player)
- Darcy Blake (sold or released)
- Peter Whittingham (depends on his attitude, but would feature)
- Paul Parry (sold)
- Chris Burke (probable bench option)
- Jay Bothroyd (would hover around the first-team when not in it)
- Quincy (hasn’t made the bench for about two months now. Is he even alive??)
- Ross McCormack (first-team player)
- Michael Chopra (loan deal made permanent, likely starter)
- Eddie Johnson (a loan deal that won’t be made permanent, regardless of which division we play in)

Therefore, looking at this list, at least 7 of the players who featured on Saturday afternoon will most likely not be with the club or given a starting jersey should we gain promotion. Therefore, are certain members of our squad playing for their futures in a twisted sense?! By staying in the Championship, several are likely to be retained or in the first team and therefore eligible for bonuses alongside their guaranteed salaries. Footballers, after all, work to bring in money to look after their families (or their lavish lifestyles) just like the rest of us, so why risk being laid off by gaining promotion? Food for thought indeed.

Dave Jones left Terry Burton left to take the potential flak and vitriol from Terry Phillips & co. after Saturday’s game and rather like our own, the wee one offered these pathetic bits of defence:

“We will need to lift the players again ahead of the trip to Sheffield Wednesday. But sometimes it can be easier to do that after results and performances like this than if they’ve done well and think they are the cat’s whiskers”

Hilarious usage of pointy/pointless cat hair aside, we’ve not exactly been the cat’s whiskers for a while now, so if its easier to lift the laaaaaaaaaads after a shower of sh*te are we to assume that you and Jonesy have been as lethargic in work as the players during the past week Tezza?!

“If you were writing your reports at half-time, you would have been predicting a different scoreline. We got into wide areas, we had a penalty, but it just didn’t happen for us”

No, it didn’t. But then matches don’t end at half-time and we went in at the interval 1-0 down with a poor end to the first 45 minutes anyway. Clearly if you and Dai felt that we were in the ascendancy in the first half then your encouragement in the dressing room at HT fell on deaf ears which says a lot for the respect shown to the authority figures.

Alas, even picking apart the words of our resident touchline-barker is a bit futile and joyless. It could be worse etc etc, but having spent so much time and money following the club this year – admittedly with some top notch showings, goals and football along the way – to end in this manner is just so, for lack of a more apt descriptive word, bad. Perhaps we ought to sign the clinical New Jersey shooter in the aforementioned Milligan anecdote. At least he freakin’ well finished the job.

Anyway, back to the game and occasion itself. The wind was the 23rd man and probably the most active throughout.Cardiff City 0 – 3 Ipswich Town Attended by 19129 sorry souls.

Cardiff City
Entering Ninian Park was a joyous experience. The ground was awash with flags, camera flashes and people, the atmosphere with songs, banter and general excitement. All the City songs got a rendition and most were sung by the diehard, the casual, and even the more reserved type amongst our support; those who normally opt for the vocal chord-resting option of watching the game. The sense of occasion was palpable. The players came out from the off to match the atmosphere and give the place a good send-off. Even Jay Bothroyd was making an effort, the most ludicrous sight of the day possibly being him pressing and charging down the opposition! All across the team the players fought for every ball, played neat and tidy football, and seemed to have a deserved reward when Ivan Campo bundled over Roger Johnson. Penalty! The exclamation mark was optimistic. Richard Wright’s palm sent it towards the Grandstand and the City team and game were indistinguishable from then on in.

Gyepes was turned and out-paced too easily for the first Ipswich goal and Johnson was equally culpable for lunging in, missing, but worse… doing this when he should been marking the goal scorer Counago. 0-1. Two questions: Why is it that we concede so many goals with Heaton protecting the net? And why is that a shot that seemed destined for his gullet somehow evaded him? As ever, Heaton’s kicking was dire – compounded by the blowing gale – so this was another afternoon to forget for the Man Utd reject. The defence started as they meant to finish and the lot of ‘em had a stinker. Distribution wise they offered nothing, and in their defending they were neither commanding or alert, merely sloppy and nervy. Parry was anonymous as ever, Burke was fading by the minute, and Ledley and Rae were second to every ball, dithered and played heavy pass after heavy pass. McCormack and Bothroyd meanwhile were wasteful and just plain cack respectively. Our all-round awfulness was epitomised when Parry lost the ball and Ipswich were allowed to lunge forward with it. Our defenders failed to get a tackle in for the entire 30 seconds that Ipswich had the ball in and around the box and BAM, Norris, 0-2, too easy.

Dave Jones at last decided to react. TWO changes at the same time really is bold for him, and so off went McCormack and Parry, on came Chopra and McPhail. With the idea presumably of getting the ball to the Irishman and using Ledley’s energy down the left as an alternative option, there seemed to be a workable plan. However, long ball nonsense meant that any logic was soon thrown in the metaphorical bin. Gavin Rae, supposedly box-to-box, was more lax to lacks. He was hauled off in the 76th minute for Eddie and any sense of a formation was now gone. With Eddie and Ledley playing left wing as well as striker and centre-midfield respectively, Bothroyd up top like a pillar and Chopra roaming, it was 4-3-3-esque I suppose. Not that it meant anything because Ipswich happily sat back and were comfortable in dealing with our players playing on top of one another with no real sense of purpose, urgency or direction. Shouldn’t it have been the other way round given that the Tractor Boys season is over!?!?!

Ipswich’s late third goal was so comical and terrible that I still cannot believe it happened. I refuse to. Free-kick on the edge of the box. Ball hits post. City players remain standing outside the box. Heaton remains on floor. Stead WALKS up to ball. Makes softest contact ever. Ball goes in so slowly it’s as if it’s making an attempt to stay out. Ball wins MOTM award as a result. 0-3. Game over. Season over? Ninian Park chapter over?

The players did that thing at the end where they flop to the ground in mock-despair. Such charades were absolutely pathetic given the pitiful lack of effort shown by the players and none of the fans were buying it. Indeed, at one point during my anger in the immediate aftermath and the closing stages of the game, I half-hoped we would fail to reach the play-off’s simply because I thought I would find it difficult to celebrate with this bunch of *players*. I soon came to my senses and remembered that Cardiff City FC isn’t the mercenaries on the pitch and in the account expenditure list: It’s the fans. And therefore, any potential celebrations won’t be for the sloppiness, lethargy and anonymity that has characterised our play and players these last few weeks but rather the celebrations of and for those who kept the club going in the hard times and those of us who put the money in these players pockets week after week. So perhaps given the supreme effort of the fans yesterday afternoon, Ninian Park wasn’t given such a bad send-off after all.

Ipswich Town
Admittedly Ipswich have nowt to play for, but with a new manager in tow and a last ever chance to stand on the terraces at a game in one of the top two divisions I expected more than the 3-400 Tractor Boys who made the journey. After winning 3-0, I bet those who didn’t bother were especially gutted. Ipswich, despite an awful start in which they couldn’t string two passes together or get the ball under control let alone impose some personality on the game (a side-effect of having a new manager too I suppose), soon turned the screw and whoever was calling the shots on the bench made some very perceptive and key tactical changes. After starting with a 5-man midfield that saw Campo sitting behind Norris and Garvan, Ipswich looked set to be the first team playing such a formation this season who had failed. City’s attacks were being launched solely down the wings and Town couldn’t handle this, especially when the FB’s had such attack-minded players in front of them (Lisbie and Dos Santos). After Alex Bruce went off injured however, Keane brought on Jon Stead, went 4-4-2 (Campo played centre-half), and switched Lisbie to the flank where McCormack and Burke had been causing havoc. The CM’s were also given instructions to tighten up, and compounded with the McCormack penalty save Cardiff’s initial zip and zest soon evaporated. These key shuffles were pivotal moments in the game and led to the first goal. With Dos Santos and Lisbie offering support to the strikers, our nervy defence could not cope with 4 or 5 Suffolk soccer players launching at them and Ipswich were rewarded with Stead setting up Counago for the opener. Similar flooding of our box resulted in the second goal, before Keane opted to get everyone sitting back once the third goal went in. Dave Jones on the other hand didn’t make personnel or tactical changes until it was too late and alas, the formerly-bearded one was vindicated while the podgy Scouser was made to look as big a fool as his pathetic players. City played long balls, Ipswich played head-away balls. Game over, job done.

Ipswich Town players worthy of praise for this showing are Richard Wright for the several cracking saves he made, Jon Stead for the attitude shown when coming off the bench and continuing it for the rest of the game with such urgency and incisiveness, and last but definitely not least young Gio Dos Santos. The former Barca potential-star and Spurs loanee is made for the counter-attacking style of play and in the second half especially he thrived. He made an impact in the more *normal* first half too as it was his lightening pace and boot-ball glue that tore our balance and system apart and allowed the Suffolk side to create opportunities.

So have we said goodbye to Ninian Park? Ahhhhh, erm, eeek, I dunno. Next Sunday’s final round of fixtures sees us away at Sheffield Wednesday, while our two rivals for the final play-off spot Burnley and Preston North End have more favourable home ties against local-ish-ish rivals Bristol City and Queen’s Park Rangers respectively. One would sincerely hope that Ninian Park isn’t closed with such a disgusting feeling in the mouths and stomachs of City fans, akin to the one felt after Saturday’s sheer humiliation. Fans of Manchester United, Liverpool and Chelsea may continue to delude themselves – as they have been doing for weeks, months – that there is still a genuine competition for the Premier League title, but for fans of Birmingham City, Sheffield United, Reading, Cardiff City, Burnley, Preston North End, Norwich City, Barnsley and Nottingham Forest and Plymouth Argyle real action, emotions and drama will be flowing from 13:15 Sunday afternoon. May the best men and Cardiff win!

Here are my predictions for the relevant games (sorry, Swansea City-Blackpool!) next weekend:

Burnley 1 – 1 Bristol City (In spite of my saying this was a favourable game, Burnley will fluff their lines)
Charlton Athletic 2 – 3 Norwich City (Too little too late as a defeat in tonight’s game versus Reading will cost the Canaries their second tier status)
Crystal Palace 1 – 4 Sheffield United (Warnock will send out half his u18 side and the Blades will seal promotion)
Nottingham Forest 1 – 1 Southampton (Billy Davies narrowly steers Forest to safety)
Plymouth Argyle 2 – 2 Barnsley (Both limp over the line and secure another season at this level)
Preston North End 3 – 0 QPR (PNE secure their play-off spot ahead of Lanc rivals Burnley)
Reading 1 – 1 Birmingham City (Kevin Doyle and one of Brum’s twenty-eight strikers to net in this tense stalemate that does neither any good)
Sheffield Wednesday 0 – 0 Cardiff City (City miss 4 penalties but somehow seal their spot in the play-off’s because so many of Tom Heaton’s wayward goal kicks escape Hillsborough there are no more match-balls left to use. Ref blows up just 12 minutes in as he promised his wife he’d put the new Ikea shelves up this weekend and so marks the result as 0-0. City stretch the word ‘limp’ until it snaps and Heath hospital is full with middle-aged men in blue Joma jerseys suffering jitters, heart problems, excessive sweating and hair and finger nail loss. Dave Jones wheels out his classic line in the post-match interview that we’ve been better than ever in these last 4 games and to reiterate, anyone who hasn’t played the game professionally doesn’t have a Ken Woo about anything soccer-related)