By CovSid67
February 11 2007

About as entertaining a match as has been seen at the Arena this season (One in a category of not many), which possibly still would have been the case had the (Thankfully) one and only Graham Poll not tried to be the star of the show. Coventry started brightly, with Mifsud being a constant threat for the first 20 minutes, before team-mates simply stopped passing to him. Such was the home sides insistence on passing to anybody but Mifsud after that spell that he was given a quarter of the pitch to stand alone in, unopposed, and unused - unless there was a Cardiff defender standing on his boots. When he was given the ball, there were ironic cheers from home supporters, clearly not happy with his lack of opportunities.

On four minutes, a superb through ball played to him saw his intended cross cleared as Adebola (Sort of) threatened, with the spooning of said clearance ending up in the grateful arms of Alexander. On seven minutes, another quality pass to Mifsud saw him shake off Cardiff's left-back with ease, before pulling back a cross for McKenzie to hammer home. 1-0.

A quality clearance from the re-called Page denied Cardiff a decent looking chance, and soon after a Mifsud pass released Doyle just outside the Cardiff area. Doyle turned the opposition defence well, but saw the ball caught under his feet, and the chance was lost.

Tabb wasted a glorious chance on 16 minutes, and, with the goal fairly gaping, McKenzie wasted the follow-up too.

Off the pitch, it was noticeable that once again any home supporter stepping out of line was taken out, while any away fan doing the same was simply asked to calm down. On the grounds that the home fans are more likely to come to more than one game at the Arena every season, while the away fans aren't, reversing this approach seems like a more financially beneficial idea to me....

Cardiff's first chance of the match came on 19 minutes, with a decent effort from a free-kick landing on the top of Marshall's net. Three minutes later, and Chopra went over in the Coventry penalty area. Rightly so, nothing was given by the referee - one of the decisions he did get right on the day (Though I thought Chopra should have been yellow carded for diving!).

On 21 minutes, Tabb spooned an effort McKenzie was trying to set-up for himself horrendously wide of Alexander's goal.

The first flash-point of the game came in the 27th minute, as a decent cross from Tabb saw Alexander and McKenzie challenge for the ball. This was a ball McKenzie had every right to go for, with his challenge leaving Alexander injured - though not that badly injured, according to Coventry fans, who booed his every touch of the ball after this incident (Which McKenzie was harshly yellow carded for).

It was following this incident that the supposedly Premiership standard referee Poll seemed to completely lose the plot, giving almost every decision 'til half-time to the away side....

Tabb was booked for a little shirt pull on Alexander after the keeper had taken a routine catch, but only spoke to Alexander after he attempted to punch Tabb's head off. Cardiff were then awarded a throw-in, that was clearly taken some 10 yards up the line from where the ball went out; and were awarded a free-kick after a Coventry player tackled a Cardiff player.

Great Coventry defending denied Cardiff another chance on 42 minutes, with the home side breaking up the pitch at a speed rarely seen by those in Sky Blue. The ball ended up at the feet of Mifsud, who, despite being 'nudged', stayed on his feet to hit a shot that hit one post, bounced across goal, and was cleared to safety.

The missed chance was to prove costly, as, with three minutes injury time added on to the end of the half, a dubious penalty was awarded to the away side. There seemed to be little by way of an appeal by Cardiff, and those that were closer to the incident claimed that if this was a penalty, then one should probably be awarded every time a corner is played into the penalty area.

It mattered not, as yet another decent player Coventry City missed out on, Michael Chopra, equalised. 1-1.

Having once again had to endure the 'dancing girls' at half-time, and the inaudible PA system, a far better idea for entertainment struck me: why not pick out one supporter giving it the big 'I am / come on then, I'll have you' from each section, give them boxing gloves, and see if they really are as hard as they think they are.

Coventry started the second half well, with Tabb set free on the left, a decent cross played in to Adebola, who back-heeled it (Or tried to!) towards McKenzie. Unfortunately, Cardiff's defence was quicker to the ball, and cleared for a corner (Which was wasted).

Having seen one non-penalty given, Cardiff fans tried again on 47 minutes, but were this time denied by Poll.

On 54 minutes, a quick free-kick from McNamee (Who once again had a fine game), saw Mifsud head just wide.

Two minutes later, a crunching challenge left Whing hobbling, and soon after he was replaced by the welcom site of the returning Stuart Giddings.

A minute later, the Coventry sides decision to back off, then back off some more, allowed one-time Coventry youngster Peter Whittingham to fire a quality strike past Marshall. 1-2.

With just over an hour gone, somebody finally passed to Mifsud (Adebola), but, possibly due to thinking this might be the last he saw of the ball for the day, he hurried his shot and put it way over the bar. Caretaker boss Adrian Heath was then told off by Poll.

A great McKenzie effort flew just over the bar on 64 minutes, then a fine run by Mifsud saw him felled on the edge of the area by Loovens. He was booked for his troubles, and having already seen yellow, he departed for an early bath. Giddings took the free-kick, seeing his effort go narrowly over Alexander's crossbar.

On 70 minutes Coventry scored the equaliser their play richly deserved. A peach of a cross from Tabb, which seemed to hang in the air, was headed home by (The disappointing) Adebola. 2-2.

Sustained pressure from the home side, who for once looked as if they were making the one-man advantage count, should have seen them take all three points - and McKenzie could have had a hat-trick.

He had a goal chalked off for a foul on 72 minutes (Probably the correct decision), saw a quality header saved well by Alexander, then scored again from the resulting corner - only to see this goal chalked off too. This decision looked harsh/wrong.

One or two more chances were created before the game was over, but seeing a couple of goals ruled out seemed to slightly knock the stuffing out of the home side, while Cardiff rarely threatened after going down to 10 men.

A far better performance, with plenty of positives (Including Osbourne growing in confidence as the match progressed), but still only one point taken when three should have been.

Finally, with racist, sexist, and homophobic chanting now being outlawed from all football grounds, I do hope the powers that be will be taking action against Cardiff supporters for their disgraceful singing of '2-1 To The Sheep Sh*ggers'. This sort of thing HAS to be stamped out, and that's what the PC-Brigade exist for....