Minority Report 2019-20 v Cardiff City

The Cardiff squad probably cost 10 times what the Barnsley Squad cost. They are probably paid 10 times the amount the Barnsley squad are paid too. They are also bigger, stronger and older/more experienced. Given those bare facts, it is no surprise that man for man, Cardiff had a lot more quality, especially after half time, when the wind was behind them. I honestly do not know whether there was anything that we could have done to win that match today. As their manager said, the pitch was difficult to play on for both teams. Nevertheless, it would not be Minority Report if I did not have a few comments to make.


After the last home game, I was very complementary about Struber’s tactics, and in particular his brave use of the press. Today, there was no point to the press, and Struber did not use it. The press only works if a team is trying to play its way up field, retaining possession and passing the ball. The idea of the press is to rush the opposition into error and inaccuracy. When the opposition simply want to launch the ball 50 yards, the press is irrelevant. Equally, Cardiff never pressed us either, and the reason was the same. We abandoned our normal way of getting the ball forward, and instead, we hit the ball 50 yards. Was the reason the pitch? Did combination of the bumpy and uneven surface, the lively wind and the absence of grass mean that our normal method of playing from the back was too risky? Because if it does mean that, the rest of the season is going to be a difficult watch, because with no forward player capable of winning the long ball consistently, May is likely to be a long way away.


It was not just that though. Usually, we keep Brown and Chaplin wider than the traditional front two in order to allow Woodrow to arrive in the box late, and take advantage of the available space. But today, because we were using the long ball down the middle, Chaplin, and particularly Brown had to be much narrower, and Woodrow had less free space as a result. The width was provided by Thomas and Ritzmaier from their deeper positions in midfield, but because they were required to stay wide, they were farther away from their colleagues, and the fluid interchange of the triangles of passes and moves were absent. As I say, Coach Struber may have felt that conditions were not conducive to our usual style, and nothing was lost by losing these triangles, but I have to say that I personally missed our usual fluidity in its absence, and was at a loss to explain the reasoning for most of my long walk home.


I also suspect that our wide players were asked to stay high. The reason for my suspicion is that neither Thomas nor particularly Ritzmaier provided enough support for their full back, and indeed, the first Cardiff goal arguably came when both Williams and Ritzmaier were caught out of position, allowing the Cardiff wide player the space and time to cut in from the right and find his intended target with a low pass. I thought that both Thomas and Ritzmaier had very poor games. It was not just that they did not support their fullbacks well enough, they never provided an attacking threat either. Thomas might have had the excuse that he was playing on his wrong side, and that might excuse his poor touch and the inaccuracy of his final pass, but in Ritzmaier’s case, I just cannot see what he offers. He is playing on his favoured left side, but he has little pace and his passing is un-inspirational. I longed to see him replaced by a better passer and Bahre would have been my choice from the bench early in the second half


So, for one reason or another, we failed to play our normal pass and move game, we failed to execute the press and we played right into Cardiff’s strong point by using the long ball forward. At times, it looked like we had decided it was a game that we could not win and had decided to have a week off. I have made the point many times before that we cannot change our basic style because we do not have a target man at our club. Today, I believe that Struber wanted to change the way that he played because weather/pitch conditions made it hard to play our normal way, but there is no target man at the club, and the change was doomed to fail. We might have lost, even if we had that missing link. Who knows, but it would have been nice to see the theory put to the test.


Speaking personally, it was good to see Mads Andersen back on the bench. There is no doubt that it was the right decision to take him out of the action, and I hope that the rest and intensive coaching has done him good. He was making too many silly errors. Nevertheless, we conceded a goal at Reading when Halme failed to read a long ball, and he was beaten for pace after the player turned and ran for goal. Once again today, he failed to read a long ball and was again beaten for pace. I do not believe we would have conceded those goals with Andersen in the team, though it has to be admitted that we may have conceded a totally different type of goal. It is merely a passing comment.


It is also unclear why Ben Williams was picked in preference to Jordan Williams and Clarke Oduor, and he was certainly partly culpable for the important first goal. However, we have got to the important part of the season when only wins will do, and that never seemed likely today because we never looked like scoring. Cardiff tactics dominated the way that the game was played out, and those tactics effectively locked us out of a chance to win.


Minority Report player of the match

It seems to be happening more and more that no-one has played well enough to earn the accolade on merit, and therefore a player is awarded it because he is the least bad. The winner of that doubtful and undeserved pat on the back this week is Michael Sollbauer.

 

Your first few sentences let the cat out of the bag and the club off the hook. As you consistently argue, it appears we simply cannot afford the quality needed for this division. Many of us argue for quality rather than quantity, but the club ownership has clearly decided that quantity, in the hope of unearthing a profitable gem or two, is the only way forward. I feel pretty sad about it, but what the hell, it’s only football after all. Life goes on (notwithstanding viruses etc..)

 

Mowatt confirmed your thoughts on the pitch in his post-match interview. He said we played into their strengths by hitting long balls because of the pitch.

If that's the situation then our general lack of height is going to be an issue at Oakwell until it improves.

 

And to think we had a team of giants in comparison in league one mostly, just shows how these owners and management have torn that side apart really.

 

Halme's lack of pace is a concern. You can be a very good centre half without pace, but you have play within your means. If you get tight you have to make the challenge, whether you win the ball or simply rattle the player; or you drop off, wait until the player turns and then challenge. On a number of occasions this season Halme has been tight to the player he's marking and allowed him to turn. From that point forward he's dead in the water as he really is slow.

 

But at least we are solvent, and abide by the financial fair play rules!

 

Excellent assessment with which I 99% agree.
I thought Dougall for Ritzmaier pushing Miwatt further fwd.

 

To put some numbers on player salaries, Barnsley FC payroll, £8.1m Cardiff City £42.5m for the year to 31 May 2019. Those figures are skewed by the fact these numbers relate to Barnsley in League one and Cardiff in the premier league.

Not 10 times but certainly over five fold. This year was always going to be tough but, even with limited resources, the approach adopted by the owners made the task even harder.

The sad thing now is that the players and manager are taking the criticism from many fans when the issues sit elsewhere.

 

Whatever someone gets paid, it doesn't mean they can't put effort in.

Ritzmaier in particular was hiding most of the second half, praying that the ball didn't come near him.

 

The players in general are not getting that much stick , but to vent your frustration s at a empty entity *our directors box,is futile

 

I agree but I'm wondering if Struber had done his homework on how Cardiff would play?

 

An empty ground next season may fill the directors box and make them reassess their shambolic decisions this season? Or maybe not.

I don’t think they give two f**ks personally. To say they didn’t underestimate this league then do what they’ve done to this team speaks volumes about their ownership motives for me.

 

If ever a club were an example of unsustainable it is Cardiff. Debts of over £200m and spent a further £20m post 31 May.

Last time in the Championship they lost £34m over the year. If they don’t get back to the premier league before the parachute payments run out they are in deep trouble.

Thank heavens for FFP.

 

Agree with this, but would go a step further.
There were very few 2nd half options on our bench to combat the aerial onslaught, but the best for me would have been Mads for Ritzmaier; moving Halme to DM & Mads back alongside Solbauer.
Mads & Solbauer were a whisker away from 2 consecutive clean sheets before Mads was rested & looked to be the makings of a solid partnership. There isn't much difference between Halme and Mads in the defensive role, but Halme is more aggressive and forceful in the aerial challenge and we needed that further up the pitch.

 

Don’t agree.

 

I don't thin kstruber has done any homework since he came here. He doesn't know the strengths and weaknesses of our own players that 11000 sat in the crowd can see. He hasn't got a clue

 

I agree regarding ritzmaier. There was an incident near the east stand where any ordinary Barnsley player was first to the ball with she'd loads of time to spare yet everyone in the ground knew he wasn't going to get it from the second it was played. Why? Because we all knew he wasn't going to try.
Result? He didn't get it

 

I still don’t agree. The team performance was shocking but I saw no evidence of lack of effort. It’s always the call of bitter supporters when a team loses.

 

We were drawing when people were begging for him to be hauled off because he was going through the motions