FA
Trophy 3rd Round - 4th February 2008
At Throstle Nest - Att 952
Report
After a first half almost devoid of any action worthy of the
name, City eventually booked their place in the quarter-finals
of the FA Trophy with a 2-0 win over Farsley Celtic. That's
now 14 matches unbeaten and leaves the team just a couple of
steps from a date at Wembley.
The first half saw only one chance at either end when Richard
Brodie charged into the box and, with a number of players
available for the pass, the big front man chose to shoot and
Curtis Aspden got down well to save. Other than that, Stuart
Elliott and Simeon Bambrook locked horns like rutting stags
before Bambrook picked up an inexplicable yellow card and was
lucky to stay on after handling quite blatantly mere moments
later. The only other highlight on a bitterly cold North Leeds
afternoon was Farsley's unique player identity protection system
which mainly consisted of players wearing shirts other than
their own. Amjad Iqbal emerged wearing 'Crossley 5' on his back
after copping a bloody nose and Bambrook had two changes, playing
as both Sugden and Billy before being substituted just before
the hour.
Whenever City have been poor in a first half under Colin
Walker, the team has generally made amends after the break
and so it proved again. Set piece delivery has not been a strong
point for some time now, so when Martyn
Woolford lined up a free-kick which he himself had won,
few expected the left-foot curling 20-yarder to get over the
wall and into the bottom left-hand corner of the goal to open
the scoring. But it did, and City were in front before the dregs
of the half-time cup of tea had been drained.
The goal didn't liven things up greatly, though City were less
nervy and a lot more comfortable from there on out. The better
chances fell to City - Woolford blazed over from Manny
Panther's lay-off, Elliott's rising drive was comfortable
for Aspden, debutant Russell Fry shot just over after Onome
Sodje's blocked shot fell into his stride and Stephen Downes
pulled off a great challenge on Sodje when clean through. Farsley
did threaten on occasion, though Anthony
Lloyd cleared their two best efforts off the line. He has
an uncanny and very welcome habit of doing that.
Sodje's introduction was the spark City needed. He replaced
Nicky Wroe in the
75th minute and immediately set about harrying the tiring Celtic
defence. He'd already forced Aspden to rush a clearance which
almost provided a chance and Iqbal's horrendous back-pass produced
a glorious opportunity, though the linesman's erroneous flag
would have rendered it disallowed anyway. A defensive mix-up
would prove to be the home side's undoing. Craig
Farrell profited as Scott McNiven got in the way of Craig
Bentham's clearance and it fell to the City hit-man who buried
a close-range effort past Aspden with just a couple of minutes
remaining.
It was not a vintage performance, though it's unrealistic to
expect such every week. With a run of games coming up, the squad
will be tested to the full in the coming weeks. "Because
it's a cup game, we'll take the victory and get into the next
round" said Walker in his post-match reflections.
"It was very scrappy though".
Some changes were enforced. Darren
Craddock's suspension and Darren Kelly's injury have left
the club short of centre backs. There was a train of thought
for a switch to four at the back, but Ben
Purkiss stepped into the breach to maintain the successful
formation. "Ben Purkiss was our
best player by a country mile, and in a new position"
was the manager's verdict. "He's
good on the ball too and the quality from Ben was excellent.
We defended well and kept a clean sheet". Only
14 games into his managerial career, it's clear that Walker
has settled into the role well. "That
we didn't play well and still won 2-0 suggests we might not
be a bad side" was his closing remark, taken
straight from the Big Book Of Managerial Cliches. On this occasion,
cliche or not, that might just be true.
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