Saturday 7th March, 2009last year, at the start of March
McCall will hope City can start the way they finish
Bradford City 5 Aldershot Town 0 At Valley Parade in League Two, 2008/2009
In eleven days – and three away games – time the promotion hopes for Bradford City will be much clearer but as a signal of intent and a send off on that decisive Odyssey the Bantams could hardly have been more emphatic.
Indeed it seemed 75 second after kick off when Peter Thorne was wheeling away following the opening goal of the game that the seven days since the defeat at Notts County could have been a lifetime of a span.
Thorne reclaimed his scoring touch darting into a hole that Michael Boulding had made in the defence to get on the end of an excellent low cross from the left by the increasingly useful Steve Jones and pushing the ball past a hapless Nicky Bull who would not get near any of the five goals he picked out of his net this afternoon.
Following on from Thorne’s goal City never wobbled. A minor incident involving Rhys Evans coming out of his goal as City failed to follow stay up centre back Anthony Charles which resulted in a not that threatening snubbed out shot at goal.
This was as much of a chance as the visitors had to get back and within minutes Bull once again picked the ball out of his goal following Dean Furman’s deflected strike which was just return following a corner which saw Matthew Clarke shoved unceremoniously from under the ball in what was an obvious penalty denied.
That it was denied was no surprise with Referee Graham Salisbury in charge. Salisbury had once denied City a goal against Yeovil following a defender pass back and sent off Jermaine Johnson in the same game in what was the wingers last game for the Bantams. Salisbury makes a habit of sending off City players but today restricted himself to ignoring that penalty and allowing Marvin Morgan to get away with the kind of loose arm across the face on Clarke which is exactly the sort of thing that he sends City players off for.
Nevertheless – and to paraphrase Sean Connery – losers moan about the Referee and winner go home with the match ball. Or the prom queen. Dean Furman deserves both for another superb display controlling central midfield. Much of how City do in the forthcoming games at Rochdale, Bournemouth and Exeter will depend on how much Furman can break up play as he did so well at Valley Parade today.
With his club Rangers making people redundant and looking for ways to save a bob or two I would not be at all surprised to see Furman starting SPL games next season – nor do I think he would look out of place – but in the years since Stuart McCall the player left the club and Stuart McCall the manager returned we have (any club would) been crying out for a replacement and in Furman we have one.
My erstwhile colleague Jason sings the praises of Nicky Law Jnr who delivered the perfect corner for Peter Thorne to glide through the air to head in the Bantams third, again Charles – conspicuous with his Afro – stood still as his man reeled away in celebration.
Rochdale’s defeat to Bury at midday had seen the Shakers go third and Rochdale drop to fourth. A 5-0 win would put City fourth and at the start of the day the task was to keep fifth as the Bantams supremacy continued it looked feasible.
A note at this point to the school who had turned up with a banner in support of “Bradford City and Zesh Rehman” and a country flag in tribute to the defender who unfortunately for the kids spent ninety minutes on the bench watching another excellent display by Paul Arnison at right back.
Arnison has not enjoyed universal support from City fans but it seems that when he plays the Bantams have another dimension and the support that Arnison offers to right winger Joe Colbeck is important.
Colbeck is getting back into the swing of things and looked dangerous in the second half rampaging forward getting a reward with two minutes to go putting in another low cross that skimmed past Charles and to sub Barry Conlon who touched the ball past Nicky Bull from seven yards out (Edit: The cross was by Nicky Law Jnr). Target man Barry using his head to stay on side by coming onto a ball which seemed to elude Shots left back Anthony Straker who chewed the linesman out all second half and never was spoken to about it unlike JJ three years ago.
Spoken about but never seen was Chris Brandon who – some two thousand years after signing for City and getting injured – made his début coming on for Michael Boulding seconds after the hard working striker had been unlucky not to add the fourth that Conlon got and would have had the fifth with what would have been his first kick for his home club following Colbeck’s low cross but Rhys Day stuck out a leg and Aldershot’s afternoon was all over, as was the game.
The Bantams up to fourth and on to the road to far off places on the South Coast following a short trip to the team we jumped over in Rochdale. When City return to Valley Parade in two weeks time the reminder of the season will have been shaped.
Realists would say that to expect more than a point away from home is too high an expectation and should City get three from three or less then it would seem that scrapping for play off places is the order of the day.
If we can score at a rate near two points a game – two wins, a win and two draws, one of each even perhaps – then we would be looking at the ability to challenge for the automatic promotion places and the play offs would be fall back.
The criticisms of City’s manager – as with the defeats – seem a long time ago with proposed successor Peter Jackson spending the afternoon watching his Lincoln City get pounded by Grimsby. McCall has got City into a position where the finish to the season defines the season.
Last year the Bantams approached the last months looking to find form and a run, the last promotion side the Bantams had were looking to hold onto faltering form. McCall’s City are well placed and pick up points at a consistent rate on the whole. The season enters end game with the Bantams firmly in the position where should we perform well then we can manufacture our own destiny.
He will hope that the finish the season as we started this game and that the start of that finish is as complete as the finishing today. As a signal of intent this – the tenth home win of the season – is as telling as they come.
When was the last season we could see just one home league defeat coming into March? – in the 31 years I have followed City I cannot recall such a statistic – promotion chasing sides should be looking to get 50 points at home – with 4 games left City have 38 so that is still acheivable.
For me the most worrying thing about yesterday was that for once a visiting side came with attacking intent and a determination to play open attractive football – and we murdered them.
You can see why so many opposition teams play so defensively and try to frustrate us, because we have so many good attacking players. My advice to Stuart would be to destroy the tape of this game so that no opposition managers get to see where Aldershot went so wrong.
Completely agree with the last comment about shots and their purists approach to the game. I felt for them because at 2 – 0 they could have snatched something with a spell of pressure before half time and the game could have been very different. They tried to play football and as a result let us out football them completely. In a funny kind of way I thought our performance against Macclesfield earlier in the week was even more impressive considering the task they set for us.
Lets not start the ref-bashing on BfB I thought Salisbury did a pretty good job, and id also state the standard of refereeing recently has been pretty good. People forget how many difficult decisions referees actually get right and get no credit for this especially by pundits who dont need to call it until they have seen countless replays saying nothing at the time, but deciding after the tenth slow mo viewing that ‘the referee has made a shocker.’ I also completely reject the ie a that refs have vendettas against certain teams. Its a ludicrous idea to say so and so always gives decisions against us. We could easily have had a pen against us in the first half when Matt Clarke had a handful of their strikers shirt for a good 2 seconds as a ball was floated in to our box.
Special mentions go to Furman of course, Arni, and Steve Jones who again looked good. Unsung hero of the season is quickly turning out to be Boulding with Rhys Evans a close second…
Cheers, interesting piece. I’d be more inclined to agree with you if Gannon had actually quoted anything any referree had specifically said that brought their impartiality into question. as it is, it seems more like a case of a manager frustrated by not being able to stand back from decisions and look at them objectively – a challenge that many managers fail to achieve.
We see it time and time again in the Premier league. Sir Alex bemoans the fact that referees have got it in for United and Wenger, Benitez and Mourinho all claiming they get preferential treatment at OT. Its the same old story I feel that managers cant see anything objectively and resort to calling referees ‘clowns, etc’ because they dont have the integrity to accept that a decision against them was correct. Warnock, Kinnear, Coleman, et all make a show of themselves constantly in post match interviews lambasting referees for decisions which leaves pundits divided for the following week. I suspect Gannon may fall under the same bracket.
I just cant understand why a referree would jeopardise his career progression for the sake of giving unfavourable decisions for a team they allegedly have a vendetta against. Its more likely a case of rose tinted specs with a dose of sour grapes.
I’m overjoyed at City’s response and hopefully the momentum can be carried into a tricky away from home period.
I agree with the previous comments, when teams come to Valley Parade to play football, there’s only ever going to be one winner. It is a shame to see a team like Macclesfield, who were happy to sacrifice football to attain a result, do significantly better than Aldershot, who, to their credit, were intent on sticking to their footballing ethics.
If City had not scored in the first couple of mins, would we have seen Aldershot attacking? I have my doubts, they like Macclesfield also came to pack the defence and midfield and had to change their ideas once we had scored in the opening 2 mins.
We played well and took our chances, and lady luck was on our side with a deflected goal, an own goal and a good keeper save when outside his box.
Long may this luck continue.
Having recently spent time in England away from my life abroad I was lucky enough to see the games against Wycome, Darlington and Aldershot. I was in London the day we played Barnet so I hopped on the tube to the end of the Northern Line and spent the rest of the afternoon wishing I stayed on Oxford Street with my wife! I have thoroughly enjoyed watching my beloved City recently and have been so impressed by the level of performances throughout the team. As a lot of people have already said, Dean Furman is an excellent player and one we should be looking to sign at the end of the season.
I am looking for some information regarding the music that is played at VP at the beginning of each match. I know the music ‘Into the Valley’ by The Skids and Jeff Beck’s ‘Hi Ho Silver Lining’ but wondered if anyone knew the name of the piece of classical music which is played when the teams run out. Any information will be very gratefully received. Thanks
We did play some good stuff – several quality crossfield balls to wide positions, energetic midfield (can we keep them!), strikers scoring. Huge game tomorrow night – keep it up City. Music is The March from Aiida, earlier in pre match I think we have something from “The Omen”.
For information: Jim Gannon states that Referees have a vendetta against his team – EverythingBall.co.uk article on Gannon
Perhaps it is the Catholic in me – Thanks Sister Raphael – but I’m not sure I’m that keen on playing of The Omen music which has as its refrain “Sanguis bibimus, corpus edimus, tolle corpus Satani” (Latin, “drink the blood, eat the flesh, raise the body of Satan”), interspersed with cries of “Ave Satani!” and “Ave Versus Christus” (Latin, “Hail, Satan!” and “Hail, Antichrist!”). That said it is the music that Simon Cowell uses on X-Factor so perhaps we should accept the glorification of the guy with the horns and the cape has lost currency these days.