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Match report


Wednesday, August 13, 2003
Bristol City 4 Swansea City 1

Bristol City 4 Swansea City 1

Dai Smith

About 750 jacks made the short trip up the M4 this evening to watch Swans take on Bristol City. The coaches were forced to park some way from the ground leaving a hazardous and unnecessary walk to the ground for the travelling support.

Swans lined up

Murphy
Jones O'Leary Johnrose Hylton
Maylett Martinez Britton Durkan Connolly
Trundle

It was Bristol who had the better chances in a lively opening 15 mins forcing Murphy into a smart save when faced with a one on one with their centre forward. However it wasn't too long before we went a goal behind. Some neat work down he left allowed Peacock to cut in onto his right foot and curl an unstoppable shot in off the post.

But the Swans did not have to wait too long for something to cheer about. Britton received the ball, surrounded by four or five Bristol players. He then embarked on what can only be described as a slalom run without skis. He twisted and jinked his way around 4 or 5 players to the by-line before delivering an inch perfect cross over the keeper for Connolly to nod in.

The ref punctuated the half with a number of needless bookings in a half where hardly a bad tackle took place. Connelly was replaced by Coates after picking up an injury. For the remainder of the half, although Bristol had the bulk of the possession, Swans were continuing to create chances through Britton, Maylett and Martinez.

It should also be mentioned that O'Leary's contribution was outstanding in defence with a number of Smart saves from Murphy.

It is no exaggeration to say that if the first half had been Bristol's, the second half was certainly Swansea's with the Swans attacking towards their travelling support. As in the first half, Britton was at the centre of most things that were good. In fact he was as close as he could be to scoring his first Swans goal. Trundle played the ball through to Britton on the right hand side of the area. Again he twisted past his marker to send the ball goalwards with the keeper stranded, but some how their defender managed to clear the ball away (almost from under his own bar).

Swansea made a substitution, bringing on Nugent for the ineffective Durkan. With the exception of a snap shot which hit the outside of the post, the Swans continued to have the better of the chances, forcing a number of corners and going close on more than one occasion.

A few moments from the end of normal time Maylett appeared to be battling with an attacker to shepherd the ball over the dead ball line. Whilst a yard out of play the Bristol player appeared to theatrically go over. The ref needed no encouragement to send Maylett off, virtually ending the game as a contest.

The sides being level, extra time then came into play. The tiring Britton was replaced by Thomas and received a standing ovation from both travelling and home supporters. About 5 mins into the extra time period the referee removed any hopes of 10 man Swansea performing a minor miracle. A ball was drilled goalwards and appeared to be effectively dealt with by O'Leary chesting the ball. However the ref pointed to the spot (with O'Leary pointing at the red mark the ball had made on his chest) and awarded a penalty for handball. At this point, I wouldn't have been too surprised if the Ref had taken it himself.

Although Murphy guessed the right way, he was given little chance with an excellent spot kick just inside the right hand post. The Swans continued to battle until the end of the game but Bristol made their man advantage tell and sealed the tie with a goal either side of the extra time interval.

A good battling display by the lads and deserved far better than the unflattering 4-1 score line.

  • Murphy 7 - Couple of nice saves - couldn't be blamed for the goals.
  • Jones 7 - Dealt quite well with a difficult opponent.
  • O'Leary 8 - Top class performance.
  • Johnrose 7 - A much more composed performance at centre back – seems to be adapting to his new role.
  • Hylton 8 - Worked hard, good going forward.
  • Maylett 7 - Quieter game from Brad, still contributed well – overshadowed by his dismissal
  • Connelly 7 - Looked good going forward, scored the goal (hope he is not hurt too badly)
  • Britton 10 - On this form we will be lucky to keep hold of Leon till the end of his contract.
  • Martinez 8 - Pulled the strings in the second half.
  • Durkan 6 - No telling crosses from Kiron today.
  • Trundle 7 Held ball up well in lone striker role – took the wrong option a number of times – Unlucky to hit the outside of the post.
  • Coates 6 – Defended OK, didn't offer much going forward.
  • Nugent 7 Worked hard.
  • Thomas 7 Not on long enough to make a telling contribution.

12-MAN BRISTOL CITY DUMP 10-MAN SWANSEA CITY OUT OF CUP

By Gareth AJ Williams

Bristol City (1)4    Swansea City (1)1 a.e.t.
Peacock 14, 108     Connolly 18
Bell 96 (pen), Coles 103

For 90 enthralling minutes at Ashton Gate last night in the 1st round of the newly-named Carling Cup, Swansea City more than matched their second division hosts, Bristol City, and were level at 1-1.

Three years ago, when the early rounds in this competition were played over 180 minutes, this would have been an excellent result for Swansea with a second leg at the Vetch to come.

Unfortunately for them, ties go immediately to extra-time these days, but with barely thirty seconds of normal time remaining, the visitors hopes of a tremendous victory were severely dented when Brad Maylett was unjustly sent off.

Referee (at least that's what his official job description is anyway) Clive Penton then compounded that shocking decision just six minutes into the extra period by giving Bristol City the match-clinching penalty for a blatant shoulderball by Kristian O'Leary.

I can remain just about impartial when reporting on Swansea matches, and so I'm not exaggerating when I write that those two decisions were quite possibly the worst I have ever had the misfortune to witness. It is an indisputable fact that Penton won the tie for the hosts. (And yes, I do accept that even though they had been outplayed for much of the second half, Bristol still might have won without the advantage of a penalty added to an extra man.)

That first dreadful adjudication came when Saturday's match-winner Maylett shepherded the ball over the bye-line under pressure from Matthew Hill. Nothing noteworthy there one would have thought, although the pair became entangled before Hill fell to the ground. Indeed, some referees may even have deemed a few calming words to the two mutually antagonized protagonists to be superfluous - especially as the third and final minute of stoppage time was about to expire - but to everybody's astonishment (and I mean everybody's) Penton showed the desperately unlucky Maylett a second yellow card. His first had come just after an hour for a rash lunge at Mickey Bell.

But what made the incompetence of the man in black even more infuriating was the role of the Bristol sponsor's man-of-the-match, Hill, whose pathetic play-acting sealed the former Burnley man's fate. The centre-back even had the gall to lie to a bunch of Bristol kids afterwards by claiming he had hit his head (I heard him say this as I waited to speak to Roberto Martinez).

As if handicapping the visitors in such cruel fashion were not enough, the referee could only wait until the second division promotion favourites' next attack to confirm what many Jacks had long since suspected - that he was Bristol's 12th player - by giving them the opportunity to secure their passage into the next round from the penalty spot.

This was on the pretext that substitute Lee Matthews' volley from just inside the area struck O'Leary, who had defended superbly throughout the match, on the upper arm. It did not. Martinez confirmed this to me afterwards as did the television pictures (and in any case, O'Leary would have needed powers comparable to those of Keanu Reeves' Neo in The Matrix to avoid such a powerfully-struck shot from just a few yards away). And I have no reason to doubt the word of Martinez, who, unlike his opposite number, is a decent and honest man and player.

I suppose it could have been worse as after a display of such rank ineptitude, it almost came as a surprise that Penton did not also send off O'Leary for his vehement, but rightful, protestations of innocence.

However, those two abysmal adjudications had already swung the match in Bristol's favour, so perhaps the official felt further punishment was not necessary, especially with the knowledge that the reliable Bell was to take the spot-kick. He dispatched it emphatically, low inside Brian Murphy's left-hand post and from that moment the game was all but up for the battling Swans.

I should digress here though, for it would be wrong to dwell too long on such negative aspects of what was, after all, a very entertaining match, in which Swansea performed so heroically.

Theirs was a wonderful display - full of skill, endeavour, commitment ... I could go on, but suffice it to say that if they can reproduce the performances of these first two games, then they will comfortably achieve promotion.

Normally I would hesitate to single out an individual for such praise, but tonight (against probably the best team he has faced so far in his brief professional career at first-team level) Leon Britton was absolutely outstanding. Bristol City's manager, Danny Wilson admitted: "I was delighted to see the back of the little bugger. He was magnificent."

If ever there were a case for a home team's sponsor to buck tradition by giving their man-of-the-match award to a visiting player, then this was surely it. Even the Bristol faithful joined in the rousing ovation for the former West Ham midfielder when he was substituted with 18 minutes left, presumably because he had exhausted himself having run rings around the Bristol players all evening.

As anyone not amongst the 400 Jacks (at a very rough guess) probably could have guessed, Britton was the chief architect of Swansea's equaliser, coming just four minutes after they had gone behind to Lee Peacock's perfectly-placed curling shot, which emanated from a mistake by Maylett.

Along with the equally skilful Lee Trundle, whom the home team's defenders also seemed incapable of tackling, Britton played keep-ball around the edge of Bristol's penalty area, as the duo searched for an opening. When one appeared, the diminutive schemer slalomed his way towards the bye-line from where he delivered a perfect chip to the far post which Karl Connolly, who had already twice tested Steve Phillips in the Bristol goal, headed home.

The home side seemed somewhat startled by this development as Swansea continued to take the game to their higher-ranked hosts, although there were few alarms for either 'keeper during the rest of the half apart from a couple of efforts from Peacock and a free-kick from Martinez that flashed just wide.

Predictably, it was Britton who was first to enliven proceedings after the interval as he came agonizingly close to scoring his first Swansea goal on his 28th appearance. Trundle held the ball up well before releasing it to Jonathan Coates whose perceptive first-time pass allowed Britton to race into the area. He got to the ball fractionally ahead of Phillips and lifted it over the spread-eagled 'keeper towards goal, but frustratingly, Tony Butler had also raced towards goal and he slid in to execute a desperate overhead clearance from virtually under the crossbar.

Except for a 20-yarder from Hill that slammed against the outside of Murphy's post on 57 minutes and a fierce volley from Bell that was bravely (or perhaps unwittingly) blocked by Stuart Jones' head, Bristol rarely troubled Swansea after half-time.

A large portion of the credit for this must go to Swansea's back four, completed by Lenny Johnrose and Leon Hylton, who all assisted in keeping quiet Bristol's dangerous front pairing of Peacock and Lee Miller for the majority of the game.

In fact the only time when the Scottish Under-21 international was able to show his class was in the tenth minute when he skilfully evaded Johnrose to burst through on goal, only to be denied by an excellent plunging stop by Murphy, low to his left.

Although some of the young Irishman's kicking and decision-making is rather worrisome at times, he appears to be a very agile shot-stopper, and his confidence seemed to grow during the course of the game to the extent that, midway through the second half, he initiated a decent chance at the other end for his strikers.

His booming kick found Kevin Nugent who, in turn, almost picked out Trundle, but Phillips just averted the danger by diving to head the ball away as the former Wrexham favourite challenged.

Trundle was to come much closer to giving Swansea the lead with ten minutes to go however. There was some splendid interplay between he and Nugent around 30 yards out, when, approaching the penalty box, the crafty striker reached into his bag of tricks to bamboozle two defenders while shifting the ball onto his favoured left foot before arcing a shot around Phillips but against the outside of the post.

On the balance of chances overall, Bristol City could not have complained had that proved to be the winner, but of course they had their very own special match-winner in Penton.

Insult was added to injury (Connolly's) and injustice when Danny Coles' headed in a third from the veteran substitute Brian Tinnion's pinpoint cross, but by then it was essentially an irrelevance. Bristol's fourth would have been comical were it not so sickening. Bell surged into the left side of the area before delivering a hard, low cross which O'Leary repelled only to see it cannon off Jones' shins and into the net via Peacock's chest.

As heart-breaking as this defeat was, Swansea can feel proud of their efforts and take comfort in the fact that they will surely never be on the wrong end of such woeful refereeing again, and, by maintaining this level of performance (or close to it) against the weaker opposition they will face in division three, the optimism of many fans during pre-season will be proved right come May.
Bristol City 4 Swansea City 1
Soccernet.com

A disputed penalty four minutes into extra time was the catalyst for Bristol City's 4-1 Carling Cup victory over Swansea at Ashton Gate.

Micky Bell tucked the spot-kick past Brian Murphy to put his side ahead after Kristian O'Leary was penalised for handball.

It was the second disastrous blow for Swansea after Brad Maylett was dismissed in the final minute of normal time after wrestling City defender Matt Hill to the ground.

A man short for the extra period and that controversial penalty against them saw the Welsh club fall apart as a Danny Coles header and a deflected Lee Peacock effort added to their woes.

Swansea had dominated for a long spell in the second half when their midfielders Leon Britton and Roberto Martinez ran the show.

A rousing display saw the Swans cancel out a 14th-minute goal from Peacock with Karl Connolly levelling with an unmarked header.



BBCi

Bristol City needed extra time to see off Swansea in their Carling Cup tie at Ashton Gate but needed a controversial penalty to seize the initiative.

New signing Karl Connolly levelled for the Swans just after Lee Peacock had opened the scoring in the first half.

No more goals followed in normal time, but Swansea wing Brad Maylett was sent off after wrestling Bristol defender Matt Hill to the ground.

Facing the whole of extra time with 10 men, Swansea manager Brian Flynn opted to keep both Connolly and Lee Trundle up front and let midfield take the strain.

Swansea had dominated for a long spell in the second half, when their midfielders Leon Britton and Roberto Martinez ran the show.

Yet within six minutes the bold plan unravelled as referee Clive Penton awarded a harsh penalty for hand ball against Kris O'Leary, after he was unable to get out of the way of a fierce shot.

Mickey Bell duly converted the spot kick past Brian Murphy and there was no way back for Swansea from there.

Danny Coles added a third for Bristol soon after, with Peacock grabbing his second at the end to book a place in the second round.


Stats supplied by Soccernet.com

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