Cardiff City and Swansea City bosses feel heat as derby defeat could spell trouble
Defeat could land Riza and Williams in a spot of bother that they might not be able to come back from
Supporters place a great deal of importance on this fixture. The end all, the be all. the one that, when the fixtures are released, everyone in the area searches for first.
There aren’t many British football games with the intensity and emotion of this one, and it rarely works out well to downplay its importance.
Ask Steve Morison or Michael Duff, who were never fully pardoned for their attempts to minimise the importance of this game.
Winning this fixture can kickstart a season, and can perhaps cover up a multitude of other sins. Defeat, on the other hand, is often a terminal affliction for a manager.
When Erol Bulut took to the dugout at the Swansea.com Stadium, he was the first boss since Dave Jones to survive a derby-day defeat, which just goes to show how hard it is to come back from losing this game.
Omer Riza, Bulut’s number two, who was questioned by the media after the Turk’s red card for a brawl with Kyle Naughton on the touchline during the previous game, will now get to witness the intense heat of this matchup up close. The way he responds to it will probably determine the course of his rule and, in fact, the remainder of Cardiff’s mainly dismal season.
After a convincing victory against play-off-chasing Watford and respectable draws with Coventry City and Middlesbrough, Cardiff has undoubtedly improved under the current manager in recent weeks.
The difference, of course, is that he’s still hoping of masterminding a charge for the play-offs, rather than a successful survival bid.
Williams, publicly at least, has insisted this squad has enough quality to mount a top-six challenge. At the moment, there’s not a lot of evidence to support that assessment, although they have certainly been competitive in most of their games with the sides above them this season.
However, the Swans are yet to beat any of the teams currently occupying the top six places. It’s a record Williams has put down to mentality rather than quality, but his comments have perhaps made life harder for him.
There’s nothing wrong with talking your team up, of course. Nor is it fair to take issue with a manager seemingly looking to raise standards and expectations.
However, a number of supporters were not pleased with his prior refusal to rule out a move to The Hawthorns. A record of two victories from seven games across all competitions has put Williams in a losing position going into this most recent derby match, and chairman Andy Coleman was reportedly not satisfied either.
The Swans’ manager has a significant edge over his opponent because he understands how to win this match, but there may also be a little more pressure on him to perform.
Williams may be in his first serious bind as Swans manager, as seen by the response to Sunday’s lacklustre FA Cup defeat at the hands of Southampton and, in fact, the quiet mood at home against West Brom.
Defeat will make his critics’ continuous rumblings of dissatisfaction louder. However, it would be very beneficial to rebuild some confidence and possibly mend some of the scars from the previous few weeks if he wins against Cardiff on their home pitch.
Read more news on https://sportupdates.co.uk/
Leave a Reply