Cardiff City 1 Burnley 2
Burnley defeated Cardiff City 2-1 at the Cardiff City Stadium at the beginning of March. Read on for my thoughts on the game.
In an ongoing theme, I didn't make it to the Cardiff game, though its postponement to the Tuesday meant that I could have done (Vickie had a crafting event clashing with the cup replay with PNE).
I'd probably decided I wasn't going to travel to the two Welsh games a month back. Swansea is probably as big a journey as Plymouth, and having stood on the Vetch when I lived in the city, the white bowl on Morfa is never going to compare. For similar reasons, I hate Cardiff, nearly as much as them down the road. They felt like a good couple of trips to give up, let Vickie do crafty stuff, as I really wanted to make it to Vicarage Road and Loftus Road in April.
The excitement in this game all came in the first half.
Reverting to a more traditional line up Burnley started with Brownhill and Cullen in the centre, Anthony and Edwards on the wings and Hannibal in the gap behind Flemming.
Burnley took the lead in the 19th minute. Anthony sent Hannibal to the touch line, who whipped the ball across, finding Brownhill at the near post.
The lead was doubled in the 40th minute, Anthony whipped the ball across the box from the left hand corner of the penalty area, Zian Flemming headed down and back across goal, for the arriving Maxime Esteve to fire into the roof of the net for his first Burnley goal.
Cardiff pulled one back in the 42nd minute, Salach putting a lopping header past Trafford into the top right corner of the net - the first league goal conceded in a record breaking 1090 minute run. All good things have to come to an end, and that defensive solidity had kept us in the automatic promotion frame despite our struggles in front of goal at times earlier in the season.
Both Edwards and Cullen forced good saves in the second half, ensuring that the game had a more nervous ending than it needed to have. Salech hit the cross bar with a strong header - he looks a handful for league one next season, and Fish firing back across goal when it looked easier to score.
With Sheffield United having lost in the interim, and Leeds drawing, the result moved Burnley to within two points of Sheffield United and five off Leeds, now having played the same number of games.
