It’s been a very fast paced start to life in the Premier League for the Bluebirds. The honeymoon phase of our promotion was quickly over as far as pundits were concerned as business began. Or as the pundits would argue; as business was at a standstill in the Welsh capital.
We seemed to be immediately written off after not spending as much money as fellow promoted teams Wolves and Fulham. Many pundits have maintained that Cardiff would be loitering around the bottom three at the end of the season. We only have to ask Chris Sutton his thoughts on City’s chances of survival.
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There’s no denying that fans would have liked to have seen the club invest more, but Vincent Tan spoke of adopting a Burnley model – spending wisely and not too much. It’s something that I’m happy to go along with, but it is important we invest at Christmas. Having said that, Harry Arter, Victor Camarasa and Josh Murphy have quickly becomes fan favourites. Plus who needs a striker when you have an old full back ready to chuck on an old number 9 top?
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That’s not to say that it hasn’t been a reality check for the Bluebirds. In the Championship you don’t always have to take your chances to come away with points on the board.
However, playing against the likes of Arsenal, Manchester City and Liverpool, we’ve seen that you must take your chances in this league – especially when you are up against top class opposition.
It’s a clinical division and you only have to look back to that first home game of the season against Newcastle, where we nearly gifted our visitors three points from conceding a late penalty.
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Then there was the away trip to Huddersfield, where we simply should have come away with three points. We still had the 10 men curse looming over us, where we couldn’t seem to capitalise on the weakened opponent or take any of our chances.
It’s been nerve wracking at times and it’s not a nice feeling to be near the bottom of the table, but I’d say it’s definitely a character building experience. Our first real test was against Fulham. We knew that this would be an important game come the end of the season. There was pressure to get three points on the board following previous games and results of those around us.
I would argue that on that day our club motto #CityAsOne was fully in force. It’s a spirit that has helped us all season, especially against Brighton and against Wolves on Friday. Yes, Cardiff have been criticised for their lack of spending, but for all of the stick, we’ve shown real character to get back to back home wins against Brighton and Wolves. On each occasion we also came back from behind to get the win. We are currently the only promoted team to get any home wins against our rivals.
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We always knew that making our homeground a fortress would help us in this division. We knew it was needed against Wolves and the Bluebirds didn’t disappoint. Neil Warnock has consistently spoken about the togetherness of this squad and we wouldn’t have been promoted last season without it.
For all of our critics, we are showing them that togetherness and ambition of fans, players, manager and owner are key aspects to survival in the Premier League. The Wolves game was a wonderful way to wish Neil Warnock a happy 70th birthday.
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We have some huge games coming up with West Ham on Tuesday and Southampton on Saturday. It’s not always going to be as good a week as this in the Premier League, but one thing that the win against Wolves has shown us is that we have character. We will continue to fight and get points on the board. It doesn’t matter what the pundits say – we know our mission and we will give it our all.
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Up the City!