THE PREAMBLE RAMBLE...
You know when you’re in the right job. You can’t hide the warm glow that meaningful, rewarding, enriching employment brings as you go about your day with a cheery upbeat life-affirming demeanour that’s good for your soul and uplifting for those around you.
Likewise it’s impossible to disguise the signs of work-based anxiety - the dark pain and torment, the daily undermining of the wellbeing of the demotivated individual. The malcontent may try to hide his unease but sooner or later the overwhelming fears and apprehension, the strong urge to escape will be unbearable. It is almost always preferable for the individual to take ownership of his predicament, to take decisive action before his behaviour becomes intolerable to his employer.
Which nicely sums up my career and brings us inevitably to Jose Mario dos Santos Mourinho Felix GOIH (Order of Prince Henry) commonly known by the diminutive ‘Jose Mourinho’.
Mourinho’s career began as an interpreter for Sir Bobby Robson (generally regarded as a Ruddy Nice Chap, Top Bloke and all-round Good Egg) at Sporting Lisbon and Porto, before taking him to Barcelona as his assistant. It’s possible that in the early days some of the sainted Sir Bobby’s conviviality permeated the troubled soul of the petulant Portuguese but prolonged success ultimately brought out the worst in Mourinho.
Each successive high profile appointment has led to diminishing returns and the self-proclaimed ‘Special One’ has become an increasingly divisive figure in the dressing room, boardroom and on the terraces. Incapable of healthy introspection his instinct has been to look around for a fall guy. He has marginalised high profile players including Juan Mata at Chelsea, Christiano Ronaldo at Real Madrid and Paul Pogba at Man Utd. At Real Madrid the fans were divided into ‘Mourinhistas’ and ‘Madridistas’
Constantly complaining about referee bias, vindictive journalism and boardroom incompetence, his singular and lethal combination of arrogance, narcissism, hubris and self-delusion has been identified by the Jungian school of analytical psychology as a particular psychotic character trait, that of the ‘right miserable sod’.
**It was at this precise moment that news came through of Mourinho’s sacking. Which I’m sure was a personal blow for Mourinho but catastrophic for my Match Report prep. Aaaargh! Ah well, ‘Drop The Dead Donkey…’
Conversely Neil Warnock’s natural affability and general propriety combined with ample amounts of frenzied battiness has endeared him to all of his clubs. Whilst whingeing self-justifying Mourinho blamed the poor results at Old Trafford on lack of funds, despite the fact that he was responsible for 11 stellar signings with a budget of nearly £400m (!) the Blessed Warnock scraped by this summer on less than £30m, bringing in 6 players of dubious pedigree and unable to secure any funding for a desperately needed regular centre forward. He is the uncomplaining pragmatic King of Cut-Price, The Prince of Paucity, indeed the Monarch of Meagreness, Sovereign of the Shortfall and Deity of Deficiencies. And we loves him, we do.
There are no prima donna Fancy Dans at Cardiff City. No blurred lines, no confusing fuzzy boundaries. The manager knows his role and accepts his and his team’s limitations and for as long as the players continue to play to their full (in some cases limited) potential everyone concerned gets the fans’ full backing. We’re all in this together and whatever the circumstances that give rise to his eventual departure, Neil Warnock contrary to all precedents and expectations will leave with everyone’s unbounded thanks, astonished admiration and best wishes ringing in his ears. He will always be welcome at the CCS. Unlike some.
Enter Ole Gunnar Solskjaer. Now, there’s ‘Fake News’ and there’s ‘You Couldn’t Make It Up’ news. Ole’s return might be welcomed by the majority of United fans, based on sentiment and a wistful look back at the Ferguson era, but any Bluebird fan would caution against unrealistic expectations of the rookie manager. Solskjaer’s disarming press conference will have pleased the faithful but his attempt to tackle the difficult question of his record at Cardiff by suggesting that as we’re back in the Premier League we can’t be too unhappy won’t have convinced either set of fans.
Most Bluebirds will have been as upset as the travelling fans at Mourinho’s departure, being denied the opportunity to taunt him with ‘You’re not Special anymore’ and ‘You’re getting sacked in the morning’ etc. And the early evening kick off is a tad inconvenient. But at least we’re not faced with a tortuous late trip back home along the M4 to deepest Surrey. Ker-ching!
This time last year we were losing at Bolton at the start of a run of four successive defeats. Which was very concerning for us, but of no interest to anyone else. By contrast today the eyes of the football world are upon us. How will we react?
It’s not easy to judge what impact a new manager can have after just a few days in charge. And perhaps it wasn’t so much the presence of the new man as the absence of the old one that was the defining factor here. But right from the start we struggled to deal with a free-spirited opposition playing as though shackles, physical and mental, had been cast off allowing them to give free reign to their huge natural talents.
Solskjaer was rightly criticised during his nine month spell in charge of the Bluebirds for his naivety in trying endless combinations in search of a winning formula based on pure, instinctive, positive attacking football, rather than putting together a plan based on the natural, if limited, abilities of the squad that he’d inherited. Mourinho’s mistake was trying to impose his philosophy on a reluctant resentful squad who failed to embrace his ideas. Based on this performance it seems unlikely that Solskjaer will endure similar problems.
Neil Warnock’s has always been pragmatic. We were not going to be able to take the game to the opposition so today’s plan was clearly to sit back, defend to the death and highlight any areas of weakness to hit them on the counter attack. Unfortunately the early goal rendered this tactic extremely dubious and handed the opposition an immediate boost. A soft foul on Pogba on the edge of the box led to a free kick and with an array of dead ball options you feared the worst. The deceptive long run up and wizardry of Rashford’s low drive left Etheridge flat-footed and the home support deflated as it took the slightest of deflections off Paterson in the defensive wall before nestling into the unprotected corner of the net.
United continued with their possession game, based on short passes, quick feet and incisive runs off the ball. Our midfield was holding its shape and Bamba put in some thunderous tackles but a second goal seemed inevitable. When it came after 30 minutes it was fortuitous - Herrera’s deflected shot dipping over Etheridge - but deserved.
Still, we persevered, heads held high, and after Rashford inexplicably dipped his shoulder and appeared to nudge the ball away in the box, Camerasa dispatched the resultant penalty and we were back in the game. For all of two minutes.
For the neutral the Man Utd reply was a delight. A bit of magic that served to highlight the huge gulf in class between the two teams as Martial danced through a leaden defence to slot his team’s third past Etheridge. For the home fans it was a real sucker punch but objectively a goal to just sit back and admire. An approach which might have been adopted by a few imprudent celebrating Manc fans in the Canton End who were removed by the stewards for their own safety.
The second half followed pretty much the same pattern as the first. We held two solid lines at the back but Paterson was ploughing a lone furrow upfront and if we were to get back into the game changes were required. Unfortunately as the defensive effort tired spaces inevitably opened up and Pogba began to exert greater influence. On the hour, Lingard’s incursion into the box drew the slightest of challenges from Bamba but it was sufficient to persuade Michael Oliver to point to the spot. Lingard stepped up to make it 1-4.
Belatedly, Warnock made the change by bringing on Zahore, allowing Paterson to drop back and play as a link man. Our shape improved and one of the few positives to come from the game was the return of a revitalised Zahore who, galvanised no doubt by the possible January arrival of £25m Emiliano Sala from FC Nantes, reminded us what a talent he can be when the mood takes him.
At the back Manga and Bamba were tiring and were guilty of giving the ball away in dangerous areas. Bamba was culpable for the final goal, losing the ball and being out of position allowing Lingard the space to run behind the defence to tuck away his second and Man Utd’s fifth.
So a crushing defeat against a revived and vastly superior opposition and, as the radio commentary rather cryptically put it ‘another three points Cardiff will have to do without’! But be left in no doubt, there are bigger, more meaningful battles to come. We had a secondary role here today, bit part players, foils to the leading men in a drama played out on a global stage.
At the end of his hapless spell in charge of the Bluebirds I described Solskjaer as being ‘out of his depth….like the promising kid pushed by a well-meaning teacher against his better judgement to take his GCSE’s a year early. His time may come. It’s not now’. Today he looked like a man in the right job, at the right time. Out with the malcontent, in with the magnanimous. Always nice to see a man happy at his work…
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