The Sprout

Bluebirds Hold Baggies

Posted by Tim_Crompton from Cardiff - Published on 18/02/2010 at 17:35
2 comments » - Tagged as Culture, Sport & Leisure

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Cardiff City 1 - 1 West Bromwich Albion

The game between the two top goal scorers in the Championship promised classy football and plenty of goals. The latter was amiss in the game but there were plenty of classy touches and neat flicks on display. Most came from West Brom as they took control of midfield, with Robert Koren controlling the play well. He was able to do this due to Cardiff lacking a commanding midfielder; both Gavin Rae and Aaron Wildig were too timid around the West Brom midfield and gave them too much time to link with their strikers.

Cardiff were first to strike after a run from Jay Bothroyd that brought him inside the West Brom penalty area before being stopped illegally by Jonas Olsson. Peter Whittingham dispatched the penalty to give Cardiff a one goal advantage within eight minutes.

West Brom responded positively, with Andwele Slory having a shot hitting the post after a neat one-two with Luke Moore. Cardiff weren’t able to get out of their half and West Brom continued to press until finally at the end of three minutes of injury time, Gianni Zuiverloon fired West Brom level after a delicate ball over the top of the Cardiff defence by Graham Dorrans.

The second half saw more intelligent touches and perfect passing. However West Brom controlled the ball in the second half and deserved more than a point from their visit to South Wales. They had a couple of chances but other than that the Cardiff defence withstood the pressure and Chris Burke had a chance to steal a win for the Bluebirds in the last 10 minutes. A poor clearance from Olsson saw the ball fall to the feet of Burke within the West Brom penalty area. But all he could do was bend it around the far post.

It was a good game to watch and Cardiff will be happy with a point, which leaves them in 5th place behind Swansea City but with a game in hand.