Match Report 2001-2002

Saturday 06 April, 2002, Division One

Wimbledon Away

We win, we stay up

Someone mentioned on the way down to Wimbledon that should City win, we would be mathematically assured of a place in the First Division next season. I remember the same being said before last season's trip to Everton but with a different intimation.

Whoever you get the idea that the travellers who follow City have finally got their (our) heads around the idea of relegation. This is the situation, we think, let's be good at it.

And in a way this is the deliverance that we all talked about last term. It would be good to drop a division and start winning some games, but not two. Wimbledon, bad pitches, bad wind. We have done this before, we can do it again.

So this is City. With Ashley Ward out suspended so Danny Cadamarteri and Eoin Jess combined up front. Lewis Emanuel came in on the left flank, Lee Sharpe it would seem will not get another start if Nicky Law can help it. Three months ago he looked like he could have a promotion built around him but Sharpe does as Sharpe is on his displays in the last few months, I would not give him a new deal.

This young City side, 37 year old Stuart McCall excepted the side had a youthful look about it. David Wetherall and Wayne Jacobs are the rigth age for senior pros. Emanuel, Tom Kearney, Mark Bower, and Danny Cadamarteri play with the eagerness of youth.

That eagerness manifested itself in a decent first half against a tired looking home side who had beaten Crewe two days before. In a poor game, City made what play there was. Cadamarteri had the first chance that was saved, David Wetherall having the rebound pushed away.

Danny Cadamarteri got on the end of a clever flicked pass down the line by Stuart McCall, the young striker, taking flack for his lack of goals, crossed inch perfect for Eoin Jess to put a edged header on that found it's way past Kelvin Devies in the Wimbledon goal. Popular thought has Jess leaving in the summer, his style of play too languid for most, but the Bantams will miss his goals. This header was the 14th of the season for Jess.

Similarly Stuart McCall is thought to be at the end of his career at Valley Parade but, like Jess, what he does seems to work. After today Stuart could only have two games left in claret and amber. I understand why, but I do regret this fact.

So everything looked good at half time. Tom Kearney looks like a quality pro, not a man making only his third start in a professional game, even his booking, for a raking tackle in the midfield, had the ring of serious holding midfielder about it. Juanjo's booking on the other hand was entirely down to his Spanish ways. For reasons unknown he was down on the edge of his own box. Perhaps he said something to the Ref to get the booking and perhaps the Ref saw the event and decided that it was a Juanjo bookable offence, but most likely the thoughts through the man in black's head were: European layer, probably dived.

One must assume that Wimbledon's stand in manager reminded his charges that they were a single point off the play offs. They came out with some gusto and started to press on City's back line. Wetherall and Bower were called on for the first time but withstood the test. City started to play on the counter, something that suited the front pairing. Junajo and Lewis Emanuel began to exploit space and pace. Cadamarteri made himself a nuisance with his speed.

Twenty minutes from time and Cadamarteri spurns a shot across the face of goal for a corner that ended with Mark Bower scoring to complete the former St. Bede's boy's amazing turn around. When Lee Sharpe looked like the man, Mark Bower looked like a waste of five letters from the club shop. Now Bower looks like the only one of the City seven who will be playing for the Bantams next season, his goal today making sure that that contract would be with a First Division club.

Sharpe did come on in the end, Lewis Emanuel turning his ankle and leaving early, but by that time the job was done without the former Manchester United man and many of his peers in the ranks of squad men of the Paul Jewell/Chris/Hutchings/Jim Jefferies periods, as one suspects will next season.

David Connelly scored a penalty at the end, for what who knows, but it was the last kick of any meaning of the game and season. City safe. Not much for a season that could have been so great, but better than the alternative.

Man of the Match

Mark Bower

For scoring the goal that keeps us up and hopefully, for a good season next year.

City Team:

Combe
Jorgensen Wetherall Bower Jacobs
Juanjo Kearney McCall Emanuel
Jess Cadamarteri

Subs: Lee Sharpe for Emanuel