Match Report 2002-2003

Saturday 31 August, 2002, Division One

Rotherham United At Valley Parade

Modern football seems to come down to a question of value for money, as in is it or isn't it?

The 4-2 win against Rotherham United was. It was two games in one. City steamrollered the hapless South Yorkshire side that has somehow managed to get to the top of the table for a good hour of the game and should have gone four up when a cut back ball from Michael Proctor found Ashley Ward two yards out only for the £18,000 a week hit man to have his attempt impossibly saved. Value for money? Perhaps.

Ashley Ward can never justify his £18,000 a week post-administration but he can justify his place in the team. He has struggled to do so for a long time but his good position for the first goal of the afternoon and sharpness for the last suggested that he was worth a starting shirt assuming all things are equal in the dressing room if not the salary slip.

Ward's goal came after Danny Cadamarteri had chased a ball down the left wing and tucked it back to Andy Myers who swung over a testing cross. Mike Pollett, the Miller's keeper came when he should have suck for the cross which was the the end of his range but credit Ward for getting into the hole to head for goal. The ball trickled in and Ash had his first strike of the season.

City were starting live without Tom Kearney and Nicky Law opted to keep Paul Evans in his forward midfield role and put Michael Standing on top of the back four. The reward was an increase in creativity and an inevitable loss of spike from the centre of the pitch. City and Standing set the pace for the game for all but a twenty minute second half spell, the man with the Gran is doing well enough to make you wonder why after five years as a recognised professional footballer he is only now making first team appearances.

Rotherham are a team of giants. City repelled then with the dominative Mark Bower and the suitable Robert Molenaar. Molenaar had a fine game providing power in the air and ability on the ground. He did a couple of Bobby Moore tackles on Darren Byfield in the first half and gave City a solid basis on which to build the win.

Gus Uhlenbeek got City's second just after half time putting a neat finish to a four man move that saw Andy Gray and Ashley Ward pushing the ball around well to get behind the Rotherham left back. Uhlenbeek's reaction was a cupped hand to the ear suggesting at the muteness of the City crowd. The Dutchman has a point. All the passion that went into the CVA and administration does not come over through the stands in volume terms. Talk to City fans and we all all thrilled that the club even exists, I think we should all shout this and not say it at games to increase the noise level at VP.

City purred like a happy cat after Gus' goal. Ashley Ward got a break down the left and managed to dribble the ball to the byline without ever knowing where it was in relation to his feet, he cut back for Michael Proctor to finish from close ranger for his second in two starts. Sunderland's signing of Marcus Stewart and Tore Andre Flo suggests that Nicky Law might be successful in keeping his loan man longer than a single month. I for one hope he can. Proctor looks a decent striker and if we could afford him I'd be glad to see him come to VP on a permanent basis. We cannot obviously and one day The Prockmiester will make someone a fine forward one day.

In the name of value for money City started a second game in which Rotherham were the better team. Ronnie Moore, who's comments in the summer about how the Bantams should be thrown out of the league were probably the best team talk Nicky Law never had to give, threw on two strikers and both Richard Barker and Mark Robbins got goals. Barker headed home when unmarked and Robbins followed up a rebound from an Aidan Davison save after Michael standing had been dispossessed on the edge of his own box my John Millan and the City stopper had been forced into a smart save.

Some may say that Davison spilled, I shall pass no comment except to say that Davison might have spilled, but from Danny Cadamarteti's shot five minutes later Pollett did spill. He took the ball into his body but failed to keep it there and running in like some kind of goal sniffer was Ashley Ward who tidied the ball into the net for the killer goal. Value for money? Perhaps not, but a very good displace from City's stand in skipper. If Ash played like this every week then there would be fewer complaints about the amount of money he draws from the club coffers.

So everything right in the World after two wins in a week for the Bantams and a record of W:2 D:3 L:1 that is fast looking respectable for a team that are dead certs for the drop. The team that does not know how to lose seem to have got the hang of scoring goals now. We stand no chance of getting to the play offs with this paper thin squad of injury prone players who either get paid too much or too little but we have nine points against the fifty we need to make sure we stay in this division after a mere six games. Carry on like this and we could secure a blissful finish of midtable mediocrity by March which would have seemed like Heaven back on the 30th of July, that some how does not seem likely.

Finish a season safe in March? Not very City, not very value for money.

Man of the Match

Ashley Ward

Had to give it to Ward after the weeks, month and years of nothingness but he was the best player on the field today. He will never be worth £18,000 a week but he was worth the captains armband and his place in the side today and that's what matters.

Bradford City Team