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In the Championship – Hegley v Warnock
Hegley simply had a nightmare and got two big decisions wrong and then made himself look very foolish indeed by trying to explain his decisions on television when he should have been putting his hands up and admitting his mistakes.
How on earth he didn’t send off Blades’ keeper Paddy Kenny in the first half for deliberately handling the ball outside his area only he will know. He said it did not prevent an obvious goalscoring opportunity, this from a referee who sent off Dean West for doing just that seventy yards from his own goal at Gillingham.
He followed that up by turning a penalty down, a decision that both managers, Warnock and Steve Coppell, though was to even things up. What a condemnation of this referee from the two managers, he must surely be looking at blowing his whistle at a much lower level in the immediate future.
As it happened, Reading won the game with two goals from Brynjar Gunnarsson with Steven Kabba equalising the first of those two goals.
If that was a good battle then we’ll now go over to Derby for manager Phil Brown’s fight with his goalkeeper Lee Camp, or should that be Lee Camp’s dad. There are obviously problems at Pride Park and Camp’s dad spoke out against the manager on local radio this week.
Obviously he did so safe in the knowledge that his son could not be dropped from the side because second choice keeper Lee Grant is injured. Not on your life, Brown reacted by replacing Camp with 42 year-old Kevin Poole.
He had the nerve to suggest he had already decided to do that before the radio outburst, I’m not sure anyone believed him, but it does look as though player/manager relations are not all they should be at Derby. And there’s no sign of Andy Todd there.
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They are worrying times for Derby – this was their eighth successive game without a win and they have dropped to 16th in the table.
There was nothing quite as exciting as the Warnock and Camp outbursts anywhere else in the league but Luton’s fantastic run of form continues and this time they had to come from behind at Cardiff after Michael Ricketts gave the home side an early lead.
Dean Morgan and Peter Holmes with his first goal of the season turned it round for the Hatters to bring Cardiff’s six game unbeaten run to an end and take them five points clear in 5th place in the table, behind Sheffield United and Reading.
If Luton are doing well then Dario G’s Crewe are certainly not, their form in 2005 is the worst in the entire league. They won on the last day of last season to stay up, their first win since New Year’s Day, and won again (against us) on the opening day of the season.
That’s it, they haven’t won since and have now found themselves right at the bottom of the league and their latest defeat came at Ipswich and this after they had taken the lead with a David Vaughan goal courtesy of a bad mistake from Ipswich goalkeeper Lewis Price.
A Darren Currie free kick brought the home side back into it and they went on to win it with a goal from substitute Nicky Forster, making a return from an injury that has kept him out since the second Saturday of the season.
The reason that result sent Crewe to the bottom was Sheffield Wednesday winning for the second time this season but how they had to work for that win. Twice they went in front and twice Coventry equalised but they won it 3-2 with a penalty from Chris Brunt with eleven minutes to go. It was Brunt’s second and his first was probably the goal of the day in the Championship, a strike from distance that flew into the top corner.
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Preston are still to win at home and Southampton have now drawn seven after the game ended in a predictable 1-1 draw with the home side scoring both goals. A Callum Davidson own goal gave Southampton the lead but Patrick Agyemang, starting in place of mystery virus victim Dave Nugent, equalised for North End, and that was only their second goal at Deepdale all season.
Upwardly looking Watford failed to win for the fourth successive game, drawing 0-0 against Leeds for whom Robbie Blake started. It was Rob Hulse who came closest though with a shot that hit one post and rolled across the line before hitting the other post and coming out.
The result keeps both sides in the play off area although Watford will need to find a change of form if they have any hopes of staying up there. Has the Boothroyd bubble burst?
It was predictable, Plymouth’s first home game under new manager Tony Pulis just had to be against Stoke, the club that sacked him in the summer for not bringing in enough foreign players.
Stoke took the lead with a first goal for the club from Luke Chadwick but the very British Pulis had the last laugh as Hungarian Akos Buzsaky won it for them with thirteen minutes to go after they had equalised with an own goal.
That was Stoke’s third successive defeat which has seen them drop from 4th to 10th in the table whilst the win for Plymouth keeps them out of the bottom three.
Nobody could quite believe Norwich’s poor start to the season but they have certainly found their form now and won again on Saturday, this time a 3-1 win at Brighton. Without striker Dean Ashton they were never in trouble and won the game comfortably with both Paul McVeigh and Ian Henderson getting their first goals of the season.
With QPR playing Palace tonight that just leaves the Friday games when we won 1-0 at Wolves as Hull and Millwall fought out a 1-1 draw at the Kingston Communications Stadium. Carl Asaba gave the visitors the lead on the hour but Ben Burgess equalised ten minutes from time who have now won just once in six games. Millwall remain next to bottom despite taking their unbeaten run to five games.
We’ve just one emergency loan to report. As the Brown v Camp battle boiled over at Pride Park, Leicester made a second half substitution bringing on 18 year-old midfielder Ryan Smith. He had joined them on loan the day before from Arsenal for whom he has made six Carling Cup appearances.
After the game at Loftus Road tonight we go into the second international break of the season, the next fixtures will be played on Saturday 15th October and are shown below.
The Weekend Results | |
Friday 30th September | |
Hull 1 Millwall 1 | Wolves 0 Burnley 1 |
Saturday 1st October | |
Brighton 1 Norwich 3 | Preston 1 Southampton 1 |
Cardiff 1 Luton 2 | Reading 2 Sheffield Utd 1 |
Derby 1 Leicester 1 | Sheffield Wed 3 Coventry 2 |
Ipswich 2 Crewe 1 | Watford 0 Leeds 0 |
Plymouth 2 Stoke 1 | . |
The Weekend Stats | |
Biggest win | Norwich 3=1 v Brighton (away) |
Total goals scored | 28 |
Player scoring most goals | Chris Brunt (Sheffield Wed) |
Highest Attendance | 25,044 - Derby v Leicester |
Lowest Attendance | 6,624 - Brighton v Norwich |
Total Yellow Cards | 26 |
Total Red Cards | 0 |
Most cards in a game | Brighton v Norwich (4Y) |
The leading scorers (league only) | |
9 | Carl Cort (Wolves) |
7 | Cameron Jerome (Cardiff) Steven Kabba (Sheffield Utd) |
6 | Andy Johnson (Crystal Palace) Rob Hulse (Leeds) Marlon King (Watford) |
5 | Dele Adebola (Coventry) Ade Akinbiyi (Burnley) Steve Howard (Luton) Leroy Lita (Reading) Garreth O'Connor (Burnley) Ashley Young (Watford) |
4 | Dean Ashton (Norwich) Morten Bisgaard (Derby) Ahmet Brkovic (Luton) David Connolly (Leicester) David Healy (Leeds) Darius Henderson (Watford) Inigo Idiakez (Derby) Clinton Morrison (Crystal Palace) Dave Nugent (Preston) Sam Parkin (Ipswich) Neil Shipperley (Sheffield Utd) |
Disciplinary Record (all games) | |||||
| Club | Y | R | Club | Y | R |
| Brighton | 21 | 0 | Millwall | 21 | 3 |
| Burnley | 18 | 2 | Norwich | 20 | 1 |
| Cardiff | 22 | 0 | Plymouth | 23 | 0 |
| Coventry | 28 | 2 | Preston | 24 | 2 |
| Crewe | 11 | 0 | QPR | 26 | 4 |
| Crystal Palace | 25 | 0 | Reading | 16 | 0 |
| Derby | 25 | 2 | Sheffield Utd | 19 | 0 |
| Hull | 14 | 2 | Sheffield Wed | 14 | 1 |
| Ipswich | 16 | 3 | Southampton | 27 | 2 |
| Leeds | 17 | 1 | Stoke | 19 | 3 |
| Leicester | 26 | 1 | Watford | 21 | 1 |
| Luton | 17 | 1 | Wolves | 14 | 0 |
The Next Fixtures | |
Monday 3rd October | |
QPR v Crystal Palace | . |
Saturday 15th October | |
Brighton v Cardiff | Plymouth v Sheffield Wed |
Burnley v Leeds | Preston v QPR |
Coventry v Crystal Palace | Sheffield Utd v Wolves |
Crewe v Luton | Southampton v Hull |
Derby v Stoke | Watford v Leicester |
Norwich v Millwall | . |
Sunday 16th October | |
Reading v Ipswich | . |