Match Report: Brentford 0-1 Bristol City
Brentford slipped out of the Carling Cup at the first hurdle, going down 1-0 to Championship side Bristol City.
The home side made two changes to the team that won 3-1 at Carlisle on Saturday, with Steve Kabba coming in for fellow striker Carl Cort and Nikki Bull deputising for Lewis Price who is on international duty, and it was the home side who started the brightest. The midfield and strikers hussled their opponents, forcing mistakes and springing into counter attacks with pace and power. Myles Weston was a constant threat, getting in behind the City defence, and wide men Sam Wood and Sam Saunders got in behind on more than a few occasions. Sadly we couldn’t make the most of this promising start, with the final ball somewhat lacking, and several good chances to get a good cross into the box went to waste.
The best chance fell to Kabba though, and it was all his own work. He hustled a Bristol City defender off the ball in the centre circle, burst forward into the box, went past the keeper but blasted the ball over the bar after he slipped at the most crucial moment.
However, as the half went on, the visitors started to get a foothold in the match, with strikers Nicky Maynard and Danny Haynes looking good, although the latter picked up a needless booking for kicking the ball away and walking away from the referee, and Bradley Orr often found good positions on the right hand side.
In a reversal of the first period, the second half was pretty much dominated by the away side, as they stepped it up a gear, while our lack of an out and out forward seemed to hurt us somewhat. However, not long into the second half, the visitors were lacking a forward, out and out or otherwise. Having been booked in the first half, Haynes hacked Ryan Dickson down, and he was shown a second yellow, meaning his evening came to a premature end.
The man advantage didn’t really show much, and around the hour mark the remaining Bristol City found the back of the net. A cross came in and caused debutant keeper Nikki Bull some problems, although there were strong suspicions of a foul, and with the keeper on the floor Maynard nodded the ball home from close range.
Without many options on the bench, Brentford continued pressing in the same manner as the first half, with a number of corners and some decent efforts from Saunders being well dealt with by the opposing keeper, Dean Gerken, and on the one occasion Saunders managed to get the better of Gerken, his header hit the bar, looped up, hit the bar again and went behind for a goal kick. Summed things up for us I think.
A late tactical change, with Mark Phillips being pushed up front to try and win some headers, didn’t really work, and although we scored from one at Carlisle, David Hunt’s long throw reverted to looking pretty useless, with most being cleared by defenders at the first attempt, and the rest ending up safely in the keeper’s hands. Think it might be time to stop using these throws so frequently, as they so rarely pay off for us.
All in all, it was a decent performance. Bristol City are clearly a good side, and showed it in the second half. Their dominance wasn’t so much because our level dropped, although we didn’t play as well as we did in the first half, but because theirs went up, and even with ten men they looked the more likely to go on and win the match. As such, it’s no embarrassment for us to lose to them, and we’ll beat a fair few teams in League One quite comfortably if we play like we did in the first half regularly.
The two debutants, Kabba and Bull, did well. Kabba looked extremely lively in the first half, but seemed to fade somewhat after his missed chance. Given that he came out late for the second half and didn’t do the warmup routine that his teammates went though, he may have picked up an injury which would explain his quietness towards the end, although he did enjoy a excellent moment where he held the ball up well, turned and burst forward, leaving a couple of opposition players for dead. If he does that regularly, and finds his shooting boots, he’ll be a good player for us in League One I fancy.
Bull looked solid enough. His distribution was decent, often throwing the ball quickly to the full backs and getting counter attacks on the go quickly, although I would have liked him to have caught the ball a bit more often rather than punching. He couldn’t really catch the cross that came in for the goal, and you can’t blame him for not getting up and stopping the shot as it was just too quick, although if you’re being hyper-critical, maybe he could have got and cleared the cross a bit better. As a number two though, he’s more than sufficient, and looks capable of challenging Lewis Price for the number one spot, although I’ll reserve judgement until I see a bit more of Price in a competitive environment.
Elsewhere, I though Sam Saunders was excellent. He and Wood often swapped sides, and Saunders cutting in off the left hand side looked a real threat. He had a couple of good efforts saved, one from a free kick and another from a good bit of play after cutting inside, and in general Kabba, Weston, Wood and Saunders all linked up very well, particularly early on, and probably should have created something a little more clear cut. The defence looked solid, Danny Foster again impressing me at right back, and Kevin O’Connor played some decent balls through for the forwards to chase, which was extremely welcome.
With a proper, out and out goalscorer in the side, I reckon we’d be laughing. The defence looks decent. The midfield, bolstered by the injured Marcus Bean, has the solid core combined with the skillful and pacy wingplay, and Weston looks a threat up top. All looks very promising to me. Let’s see if we can continue this against Brighton on Saturday!
