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The prospect of Norwich City returning to the Premier League at the first attempt looks increasingly likely after they racked up a seventh victory in nine Championship matches to extend their lead at the summit, opening up an eight-point cushion to third-placed Bournemouth, who slipped up at home to Luton. Cardiff were outclassed but never gave up, pulling a goal back through Joe Ralls before Marlon Pack was sent off.
In the end Daniel Farke’s side, fuelled by Todd Cantwell and Emi Buendía, had to slog it out, surviving a late scare when a cross looped on to the roof of their net. But they held on to pile the pressure on Cardiff manager Neil Harris, whose side have lost six of their past seven matches in all competitions.
On Monday, the Cardiff dressing room was rocked by popular defender Sol Bamba announcing to the squad he has started a course of chemotherapy after being diagnosed with non-Hodgkin lymphoma. In a show of support, his teammates warmed up in T-shirts adorned with Bamba’s name and number. The front of the tops had the message: “We fight with you.”
Cardiff started with a spurt but were floored inside two-and-a-half minutes, when the Norwich captain, Grant Hanley, nodded in after Mario Vrancic glanced on Buendía’s corner unchallenged. Slack marking was a recurring theme in a one-sided first half, with the graceful Cantwell sending a delicious effort dipping narrowly wide after swivelling inside Will Vaulks.
But Cantwell doubled Norwich’s lead after gobbling up the rebound of a shot by Jordan Hugill, who selflessly led the line in the absence of the injured Teemu Pukki. Alex Smithies surged out of goal to save Hugill’s strike but the ball dropped for Cantwell to tuck in. Kenny McLean thought he added a third on the half-hour but steered his header against the side netting.
League One
A hat-trick from Charlie Wyke fired Sunderland to a convincing 3-0 win over AFC Wimbledon. The visitors went ahead within seven minutes when Wyke bundled the ball in from close range. Wyke flicked home at the near post from Grant Leadbitter’s corner in the 87th minute before grabbing his third in stoppage time.
Fejiri Okenabirhie struck twice as Doncaster eased to a 2-1 victory at Swindon. Peterborough made light work of MK Dons as Jonson Clarke-Harris set them on their way to a 3-0 win, with Sammie Szmodics grabbing the other two goals.
Second-placed Hull did not make the most of leaders Lincoln having their match called off, only drawing 1-1 against Blackpool. Mallik Wilks gave the Tigers the lead but the Tangerines equalised soon after Reece Burke was dismissed for a professional foul through Jerry Yates.
In their previous two fixtures, Rochdale had drawn 3-3 and 4-4, making them the division’s entertainers, a reputation they lived up to in another 3-3 draw, this time against Wigan. Despite going down to 10 men before the break, Dale battled to a point thanks to a dramatic equaliser from Stephen Humphrys in the 95th minute.
One-nil away victories were in fashion on Saturday as Gillingham downed Accrington, Charlton edged past Bristol Rovers, Ipswich beat Burton and Portsmouth held off Fleetwood. An Oli Finney strike earned Crewe a point at Plymouth, who had taken the lead through a Luke Jephcott penalty.
League Two
There were only two victories in the fourth tier. Barrow leapfrogged Scunthorpe to move up to 20th in the table thanks to Josh Kay’s strike.
Leyton Orient left it late to down Morecambe 2-0; Nathaniel Knight-Percival put the ball into his own net in the 88th minute, before Lee Angol sealed the points in injury-time.
There were four 1-1 draws out of the 10 completed fixtures. Eoin Doyle’s equaliser earned a late point for Bolton against Cheltenham. Colchester and Cambridge ended even after Greg Taylor’s own goal cancelled out Harvey Knibbs’ opener. Forest Green and Port Vale shared the spoils, as did Walsall and Oldham.
The bottom two, Grimsby and Southend, played out a goalless draw, with 22nd placed Stevenage being held 0-0 at home by Tranmere.
The gnawing thing from a Cardiff perspective is that this game could have taken a different path had the Liverpool loanee Harry Wilson shown greater poise after being slipped in on goal by Robert Glatzel with just 18 seconds on the clock. Norwich got away with one as Wilson fluffed his lines, a poor first touch putting paid to his chances of beating, in effect, the fourth-choice Norwich goalkeeper, Daniel Barden. The 20-year-old spent last season on loan at eighth-tier Bury Town and was again drafted in from the Under-23s for his full league debut following a goalkeeping crisis, with first choice Tim Krul among several Norwich players recovering from coronavirus.
Norwich looked like scoring every time they poured forward and, depending on how pernickety Farke was feeling at half-time, the Norwich head coach could have been aggrieved his players only had a two-goal advantage. The startling thing given the explicit gulf between these teams was that this was a heavily depleted Norwich side: they flowed seamlessly despite the absence of nine players, including Marco Stiepermann, a key cog en route to being crowned champions two years ago, and their talisman Pukki.
Harris is in the market for defensive reinforcements, namely a right-back, and without injured captain Sean Morrison they looked susceptible in the heart of defence. How they could have done with Bamba orchestrating a green backline. Joe Bennett shifted to centre-back, while at left-back the teenager Joel Bagan had his hands full with the roaming Buendía. On the opposite flank, Cantwell did his best to make Leandro Bacuna, a midfielder utilised as an emergency right-back since last summer, look silly.
Cardiff spurned a golden opening in the first half when Vaulks slid in Bacuna with a cute pass, only for the full-back to send in a bumbling cross that dribbled into Barden’s hands. Cardiff will consider it a travesty they failed to give a rookie goalkeeper a true workout but earned a lifeline when Ralls powered in. Pack’s dismissal made a tough task harder but the substitute Kieffer Moore kept a free-kick alive to enable Curtis Nelson to send a tame header at goal. Norwich would have been seething had it gone in.
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