Home
With all the bad news coming out over the past few days, it was a relief to see the Tyrers coach in the Unibol car park, ready to take us on the long trek to the Liberty stadium in Swansea.
It was a credit to the unpaid Andrew Dean that he was there to see us off as usual on a cold, damp and miserable morning.
It was difficult to concentrate on the football as off-field matters dominated the conversation on the way down, with everybody agreeing that the sooner this whole sorry mess is sorted out, the better.
We refuelled with a full English breakfast at Strensham services, just before we crossed the border into Wales.
We received a friendly welcome from the Swansea fans in the Harvester pub.
They were complaining they had a relatively youthful team because of a perceived disinclination to invest by their American owners.
We countered with that if they thought they had problems with their owners, they should try ours!
Phil Parkinson brought back Luca Connell for the banned Jason Lowe and Sammy Ameobi for the unlucky Joe Williams.
There wasn’t a lot between the teams until referee Gavin Ward stepped in.
I wouldn’t argue with the penalty decision but, crucially, he harshly booked Craig Noone, who the Swansea fans had been booing all match because of his previous Cardiff connection.
Then, when Noone stood his ground as Oli McBurnie ran at him, the referee inexplicably gave a second yellow and the subsequent red.
The decision to send David Wheater off was equally contentious as not many people would regard a tackle on the halfway line as denying a clear goalscoring opportunity.
To compound matters, he judged Matt Grime’s horrendous tackle on Josh Magennis as not deserving of even a yellow card.
With what felt like 9 v 12, it was only a matter of time before Swansea scored, despite the heroics of Remi Matthews.
On the return journey, thoughts turned to whether there will even be a match next Saturday with the police and stewards not being paid.
Will our season tickets be valid on the turnstiles, if our direct debits haven’t been collected?
Just as we are about to play crucial matches, our squad will be seriously depleted with suspensions and injuries.
We started to look at who we might be playing in League One next season, just in case we’re still in business.
Source