Premier League 2018/19: Cardiff City vs Wolves

What on earth can you say about that? Neil Warnock’s Cardiff side came from behind to beat Nuno Santo’s Wolves in South Wales on Friday night as Wolves’ dismal run continues. Since playing Crystal Palace at the beginning of October, Wolves have scored once from open play in six games. Prior to the Huddersfield and Cardiff games, the problem for Nuno’s side had largely been down to not having enough conviction in front of goal, however, over the last 180 minutes of football that they’ve played, new problems have started to arise. Rather than not being good enough to take the chances, Wolves are now not creating many chances of note. Of course, credit has to be given for Cardiff and Huddersfield for restricting Nuno’s side, but it seems to be the same problem at the moment.

Wolves struggle to play their free-flowing football against teams that pack the midfield and Friday night was no different as Warnock went to three at the back to counter Nuno in what was a 3-1-4-2 formation. The central midfield triangle of Joe Ralls, Aron Gunnarsson and Harry Arter had the upper-hand over Neves and Moutinho for the majority of the evening as seemingly most midfields do when it’s a three on two situation. That’s not a dig at Neves and Moutinho, not by a long shot as the system is failing them, all the same, changes will be made for the Chelsea game after Neves picked up his fifth booking of the season. We will revisit that later.

Team News

Nuno made a couple of changes as Adama Traore was brought in for Ivan Cavaleiro and Romain Saiss was brought in for the previously ever-present Ryan Bennett. While nothing official has come out from the club, one can only imagine that Bennett had a slight knock which is why Saiss replaced him as the Cardiff game was meant for someone like him. To be fair to Saiss, he did put in a good shift, even if he did pick up what is his mandatory yellow card. Traore was Traore, he excites and frustrates in equal amounts and despite a couple of glimpses, he didn’t look that threatening.

The hosts replaced Greg Cunningham with Junior Hoilett and Kelvin Harris with Josh Murphy. Looking at the scoreline, it’s fair to say it worked a treat and despite going a goal down to yet another goal from a set piece, Cardiff, on the whole, looked like the better side.

In this tactical analysis, we will look at how the three goals were scored, an example of how Cardiff’s midfield was superior and maybe a couple of other bits and pieces chucked in for good measure. Without further ado, let’s get cracking!

A Fine Start For Wolves

In the preview for the game, we looked at Lewis Dunk’s goal for Brighton against Cardiff a few weeks ago and noted that it came about from an outswinging freekick. Nuno finally seems to be reading the previews (I’m joking) as an outswinging corner created the opening and only Wolves goal of the game.

Wolves finally recognised Moutinho’s inability to get any real distance on his corners as Jimenez moved to the near post before rising highest and having an effort well saved by Neil Etheridge in the Cardiff goal. The eventual goalscorer, Doherty is being marked by Gunnarsson. Not for long.

Etheridge does fantastically well to get down and save Jimenez’ effort, nonetheless, he is let down by his defence. Gunnarsson has a hold on Doherty, but when the Irishman breaks free, there’s not enough time for the Icelandic midfielder to recover and Doherty puts it into the roof of the net. 17 minutes in and a goal to the good, things were looking good for Nuno’s side. Historically, this season, Wolves don’t lose when they take the lead. That’s a fact. Asides from draws against Arsenal and Man City where Wolves had taken the lead, Wolves always win. Not this time. Hence the slight panic which is emanating from Wolves fans on social media.