The sky is a splendid azure blue, and the bricks of Bloomfield Road are red, neat, their 90 degree angles offset by the gentle curve of bay windows. I wonder how this looked in the 1930s in the throes of optimistic growth or in the 50s when the town and the club were the embodiment of a post war boom and the tangerine wizards had genuine claim to be amongst the best in the world.
A lambretta, gleaming as if the rider stops and polishes the bike with a chamois leather at every junction passes the building crowd. A police sergeant paces back and forward on the opposite side of the road, watchful and restless as Cardiff fans queue. In the upstairs window of a flat, curtains flicker and a gaunt face looks out from between faded fabric as if suspicious of what is going on outside.
What do I want today? I just want us to not be shit. I don't know what to expect. Judging by the buzz pre match, no one else does either. The cynicism of recent weeks is gone, replaced by a sort of hope - it's not a 'get into this lot, we'll smash them' kind of hope, but more just a sense that we might dare to have half an idea. We've definitely been better since Evo arrived but expectations are the enemy of happiness and Cardiff are actually any good so extrapolating from wins against a painfully shit Peterborough and a not so shit but nonetheless in the conference Scunthorpe isn't really going to get us anywhere in terms of certainty.
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We're good from the off, there's an energy to our play, a pressing, urgent, forward looking sense of purpose that has been conspicuous by its absence this season. It's like the whole team are Niall Ennis as we push up and snap at them. We have what you might call 'bite' - We're all over them and it's everything I didn't dare dream of, us, high up the pitch, terrorising Cardiff, threading passes, flicking it first time, aware, alert and imaginative. Bowler turns on a 5p piece and races up the middle, a shot forcing a half decent stop. Fletch prompts with the pomp of an orchestral conductor. It goes on for 15 minutes, the best chance falling to CJ who seems to be playing as both full back and a third striker and who, after good work to get himself the opportunity, hits the side netting when a goal looked almost certain.
For all the pressure, we don't score. The noise is constant though, there's something in the air - this is exactly what we want. We might not be in front, but we look like we want to be and we look like we want to play football. The players have gone from a few weeks ago treating the ball like the lurgy to seeking it out and it's great to see. This is proper stuff, this is chants back and forth, blood and thunder stuff. This is Eng-ger-land vs Wales, 1953 plays 1927, sheep shaggers vs smackheads - Full marks though to Cardiff for 'you're just a shit Barry Island' which did make me smile.
Then, we're not all over them. Then, they're in charge and it's a blue tide, neat, incisive and relentless. Suddenly our dream that we're the team on the pitch that is any good seems a bit premature, maybe we're just going to flatter to deceive and then get blown away...
Ladies and gentlemen of tangerine persuasion, I present to you, Bailey Peacock Farrell. He's a one man wall, a green clad singular army, as Cardiff do everything but score. He's down to his left, his right,, he's tipping them over, he's sweeping the edge of his box, he's punching, flicking and claiming crosses. He's out to smother chances like a fire blanket - He's absolutely fucking sensational as he hurls it out, making Peter Schmeichel look like a limp wristed floppy armed soft arse in comparison. It's a breathless 20 minutes as the Bluebirds try everything to murder us but find BPF in the form of his life.
The game settles into some kind of equilibrium. We've gone at them, they've gone at us. Now we trade blows. CJ does a few quintessentially CJ things, my favourite is an air kick after he's done brilliantly to keep the ball alive. If he was any good he'd actually be Ronaldo. BPF makes another save. Bloxham hits a loose ball brilliantly and the Cardiff keeper is flying to right, the ball is whistling away from him and the post is in his way. The noise. Oh, the noise. How is this the same ground that muttered and grumbled it's way through recent games? Bowler finds himself on the right, is played into the box by the beat of the drum and though his shot is weak, it's a moment of thrilling potential.
Probably the best moment of the half in terms of understanding what has changed is a moment where Bowler (yes, that is correct) wins the ball back with some firm tackling (yep!) and feeds Bloxham, who wrestles and fights and retains the ball. This pleased me deeply, not because it's a particularly great moment but, because it's two players who have looked fitful, diffident, if I was being particularly scathing, a bit half hearted and who are giving their all - these are players who, if we can get exceptional effort from them, we'll get, sooner or later, an exceptional reward.
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In some ways we're lucky to be level - in others, maybe we should be ahead. It's been a great half, absorbing, pulstating, some bits of real quality from both sides. This isn't a typical League 1 game - we've got two teams that want to play and some players capable of playing. Yes, we've given chances away, yes we've given the ball away - but we've made chances of our own and each time we've turned the ball over it's been an attempted pass that is trying to set us away and that's such a difference from just booting the ball into the corner and hoping for the best. I'm not sure what comes next, but I've enjoyed this so far.
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What comes next is, we fanny about a bit at the back, but manage to squirt the ball forward and then, because we've drawn them in a bit (cos fannying about is at times useful and mixing it up is the key to happiness at this level), Bowler is set free in the middle and he drives, then, just as visions of an electric goal appear, he offloads an inch perfect pass, putting Super Ashley Fletcher, up against the keeper. This is where he might scuff it, fall over, hit the corner flag, air kick it so hard his boot flies off into his own face, but no, not this time, not this Ash Fletcher, because he's composed, he's in charge, he's a cut above. Fletcher shows exactly why there ain't nobody better as he makes to drag the ball one way and then, instead, smashes the ball into the roof of the net, him against the keeper looks like a big kid playing against his little brother and the place has erupted.
I'm surprised in a way, I'd been happy with the first half, but we've come out in the second and put ourselves in front. Maybe...
Cardiff come back at us... BPF again making saves. Cardiff have a run of corners that never seems to end. We're under pressure and us being in front seems to make it higher stakes because whilst at kick off I just wanted us not to be shit, we haven't been shit and we're in front and now all I want is the three points. I want us to defend and we do. Horsfall and Ihiekwe are brave, stepping out numerous times to cut out attacks. Casey mops up behind them. Cardiff put a gilt edged chance, a downward header from a late run into the box just wide when it felt as if it couldn't be missed... In return, Zac Ashworth works their keeper with a brilliant drive from the edge of the box after a clever little freekick where Hansson ran to a short ball and faked intent perfectly, leaving it instead to roll to the man behind him and Cardiff half a second behind play. Brown and Honeyman buzz around and break up play. Honeyman is in his element - I thought first half he looked a little bit lost in the system - but this half he's just in Cardiff faces, instantly, it's like they get the ball and he teleports to a place they want to go to with it.
A Pool break, Bloxham fights for it, he's done brilliantly and he's forced it forward. Hansson, on for the injured Bowler has it and is charging, right up the middle, and then, like Bowler earlier, just as I think he's going to take it himself he lays it, perfectly weighted into the path of the galloping Fletcher and the big man is bearing down on goal, the big man is looking so calm, balanced, elegant and cool as time slows down, the keeper comes and he flicks it, deftly over him and agonisingly, deliciously beyond the despairing man on the cover and into the grateful net. A beautiful goal. A beautiful moment. I think my soul briefly leaves my body as the ground shakes. This man is a real player. He might be a box of unpredictability but when he's on it, he's absolute class and he's on it like he's rarely been to day.
Then it's all about Bloxham. The man has run himself ragged and as Cardiff throw more players forward, Bloxham seems to get chance after chance. He's set free by Fletcher, with a pass as beautifully delivered as a world class snooker player rolling one up the table to cover a pocket, Bloxham can't not be through on goal with service that good, he must score... he's foiled by the keeper, he's put through again, this time he must surely score... and he seems to dally before striking it and a defender hurls himself full length and stuns it away for the corner. Each chance seems to eat away at Bloxham's very being, he's lies, full length, hair matted with sweat, his barrel chest heaving, he strikes the turf with his hands, he just can't buy a goal...
Then... another quite magnificent pass by Ashley Fletcher, skimming it perfectly into the path of Bloxham, charging through again, curving his run, taking the ball into the box, drawing the keeper, going too wide, he's blown it again has he? No, it's not too wide as he shimmies, and leaves keeper for dead and then turns the ball across the six yard box and again, a Cardiff defender flails, to no avail and the ball is rolling, like a perfect golf putt, into the far corner and for the third time, the players are running to the corner flag to celebrate and Bloxham again sinks to the floor, flat out in sheer relief.
It's over as a contest and I can't quite believe it. I don't want this to end. It's been a dreadful season for the kind of football we want to see (y,know, shots, goals, skill, that type of thing) and we get yet more. Bloxham gets another chance from a wide angle and hits it low, hard, accurately and is only foiled by a really good stop from their keeper. Banks maybe should have added a fourth as Bondo puts him through with an alert and accurate pass but the winger's shot is a bit too close to the keeper.
It's not quite the perfect day in the end -Cardiff score one as BPF struggles to gather a shot that fizzes off the turf and spills right to their man - it doesn't matter. It's immaterial. I'd much rather BPF make the mistake at this point in this game than at a crucial point in another. Mistakes happen, and BPF has been awesome today and perhaps such things will serve just to keep us working, remind us to be alert and keep us yearning for clean sheets. Maybe it's better not to get everything we want so soon?
The whistle is cue for the players to collapse - they look absolutely drained, they sit, they lie, they stretch and they seem to all take it in on their own for a few moments - then they pick themself up and come together. Evo is dealing hugs and manly congratulations. CJ is grinning and waving to whoever it is he always waves to. Bloxham and Fletcher are leading the charge, Bloxham bouncing like a giddy teenager after a few ciders at a village fete with Fletch his suave mate. There's a Fletcher fist pump, like everything he does today, timed perfectly, then, brilliantly, a Bondo fist pump (which he equally brilliantly, mistimes) and then Evatt, slightly sheepishly has a go of his own, caught between the desire to let it go, cos Fletch has already done it and to live the moment, because fuck me, this sort of thing is a bit special, and what comes out is a kind of wave-fist pump hybrid that looks endearingly uncertain.
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This was the best game we've seen at Bloomfield Road for ages. I'm going to be uncharacteristically generous to the opposition and say, Cardiff more than played their part. This felt more like a championship game than a typical league one match, with two teams set up intelligently, plenty of technique on display and both sides willing to risk going forward. There was none of the 'sit deep, waste as much time as you can and just bang it forward' stuff here. It ebbed and it flowed and there were moments when, had BPF not been on the form he was, had passes had half a yard more on them, had forwards had a bit more composure then they could have been leaving with more than they did.
They didn't leave with anything though, and we thoroughly deserved what we got - not because we nullified them completely - but because we made so many chances of our own - and that is what we have singularly failed to do this season. I'm pretty confident that we've already scored more goals from open play under Evatt than we did in the preceding months of the season - and that speaks to the fact that he's added structure, yes - but that he's also brought freedom and adventure - we have a squad of good players, so it makes sense that we should actually carry an attacking threat and even with only three games of this new regime behind us, it's feels increasingly mysterious as to how this lot managed to look so toothless and devoid of ideas and energy, when we've just seen a performance full of exactly what was missing previously. Who wants to watch frightened football where everything you do is about stifling the opposition? Not me - I want to see us like this, backing ourselves to score goals, not being terrified of the other side but looking to get into them, behind them, over them, around them, through them. Daring to risk losing to win games. That is precisely the exact football I love.
We were excellent collectively. BPF and Fletch stood out for their contributions at the decisive points - but you can't play as well as this without everyone doing a job. Brown might have given the ball away more than anyone, but I loved his ability to see the pass he wanted to make and try it quickly - he was trying to set us away all the time and gave us tempo as a result and meant our possession deeper was still always looking to become attacking possession. Bowler, I've not been totally certain about as a central playmaker - but today, I think he put in as close to an 'all-round' performance as we've seen Josh Bowler give - he intercepted, he tackled, he pressed, he tracked and he looked a threat in the spaces he found. Hansson similarly, I really like his ability, but he's not really done anything up to this point - and today he slotted into Bowler's role and looked a threat and provided an assist - it is really positive that these two have given us something - because we recruited a squad of wingers, and now don't play with them, so it matters that they can adapt because (Bowler in particular) we can't afford to waste such talents. All things considered, I was probably most pleased for Bloxham, who has deserved that goal, not simply for his effort today, but his effort over the last three games and for BPF who looked, frankly, like the international football with top level pedigree he is and, after the stick he's taken, it's a joy to see the sea air working its magic on yet another castoff from elsewhere.
It's one win, it's one performance, it's a long season and who knows where we can get to - but it's a template and it's a statement - it's proof that actually, we do have some real quality, we can play really good football and we can beat good teams. I didn't dare hope that it would be this good this quickly, I don't dare hope that we hit that level every week - but just knowing that we can makes all the difference in the world. It's only a football match but, for that experience today, the world seems a better place and that, really is the point of it all.
Onward
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