City shared the points with Bradford at Valley Parade last night, and despite both teams having decent spells, a draw felt like the right result.
Valley Parade hasn’t been a tough place to go in recent years, but this is a new Bradford, a side we found to be well organised, much like us. The game took a very different shape as it developed, but it started in frantic fashion.
James Collins, recalled to the side, is the darling of City fans. He’s currently 12th in the all-time top League One goalscorers list, and will move to tenth with six more goals. That sort of clinical finishing has been needed of late, with City starting fast, creating chances but not scoring.
Last night City started fast, created chances, and, surprisingly, didn’t score. His chance early doors was by far the best of the night for us, created by the excellent Adam Reach. His centre found Collins maybe eight yards from goal, and you’d put your life on him to score. Instead, the yellow ball flew high into the night sky as if filled with helium, and that was a continuing pattern throughout the night.
It seems we’re good at creating that one big early chance, and while plenty more sailed over the bar in the first 25 minutes, Collins’ had the best opportunity. His miss was no worse than Freddie Draper, Ben House and Rob Street over the last few games, and perhaps it was a good thing. In a way, it underlined the fact the leading scorer being on the bench hasn’t been a big part of our problem.
We’re creating chances, and that has to be a good thing. We’re not scoring them, but we’re creating and a plethora of different players are getting on the end of them. That’s two outta three, and as Meatloaf said, that’s not bad. Get three outta three, and we’ll be troubling Stockport County at the top of the table.
We controlled possession, which was highly unusual, but it showed that you don’t need to have the ball to be a good side. Bradford let us have it, asked us to break them down, which is what we often do. I thought we did that well, right up until the finish, with Justin Obikwu putting in an eye-catching performance. I likened him to Ollie Palmer, which isn’t entirely fair as I don’t like Palmer, but Obiku has a similar style. He’s all arms and legs, unorthodox but still a threat.
I’ve seen some criticism of the referee, a man who in the last calendar year has officiated games involving Solihull Moors, Sheffield Wednesday and Jubilo Iwata. He has vast experience, and while he was a little whistle-happy, I don’t think there was a major problem with his decisions. He didn’t try to let the game flow, and he kept his cards in his pocket for most decisions. The choice to book Metcalfe for a dive seemed harsh, but we benefited. No bookings for us, and we’re now only the second-most booked team in the division.
I quite liked Bradford if I’m honest. They’re a lot like us, a team with a bit of ability in key areas, but who work hard for each other. The game ebbed and flowed nicely, nothing really clear-cut coming after our opening spell. By half time I think there had been one Reach shot on target from something like 16. Would you expect that for two teams that like the opposition to have the ball? Yes, but for the fourth game in a row, I’d expect us to take the lead.
That’s not to say we deserved to win. Bradford looked slicker in the second period and we did ride our luck at times. Wickens was equal to a couple of efforts, and it was another good night for the keeper. When he did look beaten, after Bradford’s triple change, Joe Wright popped up an inch or three short at the back stick.
The changes were interesting, because Bradford fans have remarked that don’t have much from the bench. I thought Halliday and Wright changed things for them, and maybe for us the changes were about preservation. If we were going to push for 1-0 all out, I think getting a bit of width on might have been nice. Rob Street had a quiet evening, and while House hustled and was one of our better players, he doesn’t offer the width. I get that bringing Towler on and edging Reach forward had that intention, but I can’t help but feel ten minutes of Erik Ring would have given them something to think about in behind.
That said, could we really criticise being happy with a point with ten to go? We didn’t curl up in a ball and ask to be kicked, far from it, but we’re only the second team to take a point from the Bantams at Valley Parade, and the first to stop them scoring. We’re only the second team to stop them scoring, home or away, since the season started, and that points to our strengths.
I’ve got an article out later looking at promoted clubs and what patterns there are in their numbers – the surprise is that not conceding goals is actually more important than scoring loads. I’ll back that up later, but xG again and conceded goals are key attributes that all promoted sides have, while scoring lots of goals is secondary.
You do have to score some goals though, and Michael Skubala will surely be concerned with just one netted in the last four outings. When you look at our chances, we should have been 1-0 up in each of those four games before 15 minutes, but early goals were an element of our early success. Putting chances away is now an area to work on, but in terms of shutting teams out, we’re still doing a decent job.
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There were big performances from the defence. The wide defenders did well, Reach in particular, looking like a big threat. Darikwa had a decent game, but Tyriek Wright gave him a few issues when he came on later in the game. Hamer and Bradley were both colossi at the back, with Bradley really shining in his battle with hardened campaigner Andy Cook.
I felt we probably lost the midfield battle, McGrandles looking a little loose at times, and Tom Bayliss drifting in and out of the game. Maybe that’s the eye test playing tricks on me, but I felt that when the game shifted (as it did two or three times), it was a result of the midfield battle being lost. Still, in possession, we were tidier than Saturday, and it wasn’t a bad performance by a long shot.
I know up top there will be some moaning, especially from the ‘don’t score, bad’ brigade, but honestly, I thought we did well up to the final finish. Obikwu was certainly eye-catching, but House put a real shift in, and Collins had two or three chances to put us ahead.
We weren’t hanging on at the end, but we were the team looking likely to concede, and Tommy Leigh’s wild effort was a carbon copy of a couple of ours of late. In the end, a 0-0 draw is a decent point.
It was always going to be a tough night on the field, but a poignant one on it. I’ve always liked Bradford City, the people are great and they’re a sleeping giant. That stadium and support deserve Championship football and I believe they’re now a big player at this level. You don’t get 20,000 every week and expect to stay in League One, and they’ll quickly shift from ‘recently-promoted’ to ‘promotion contenders’ in my opinion. They’re bigger than us, but they’re not better than us, which is to our credit not their detriment.
Now we get a week or so grace to go off on a Salford City FA Cup adventure, but we can do so knowing while we only took one point from the last six, it was a point worth having.
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