Buzzin Championship Football

First things first. Let’s not get too carried away with Peterborough beating Cardiff for the second time this season. As I mentioned on Friday, the current leaders have a terrible record at London Road and even though Posh had to come from behind yet again, their victory underlines the idea that it’s the bottom of the table that’s more competitive than the top right now. Although it’s a tremendous result for Darren Ferguson’s side, Cardiff still have a four point lead, a game in hand and a far better goal difference than Hull.

The biggest spanner in the works at the top end of the table was provided by Burnley. Sam Vokes’ late equaliser at Vicarage Road meant that Watford go into tomorrow’s game at Hull four points behind the Tigers instead of two. I’ll take a closer look at that game tomorrow, but suffice to say that if Cardiff’s win over Crystal Palace at Christmas was the biggest game of the season so far, tomorrow’s match at the KC Stadium is easily the second biggest. What a shame neither of those games were available on television.

At the bottom, it looks like Bristol City and any two of the seven clubs above the Robins will be competing in League 1 next season. City’s 3-0 defeat at Derby on Friday night left them six points adrift at the bottom of the table with seven games left to play. Wolves, Peterborough and Sheffield Wednesday all won, which meant that Barnsley dropped back into the bottom three following their defeat at Hillsborough.

Having said that I was going to focus on three games on Friday, I rather stupidly assumed that Leicester wouldn’t drop out of the playoff places. However, having played almost all of the game against Millwall with ten men after Wes Morgan was sent off after two minutes, a late strike from Alan Dunne earned all three points for the Lions and made today’s post a lot easier for me. Despite having the best defence in the Championship, Leicester have failed to win any of their last six games and have dropped out of the top six for the first time since the end of September.

That leaves us with two huge games over the next couple of days. This afternoon’s game of the day is at Ashton Gate where Sheffield Wednesday take on Bristol City in a game that the hosts need to win to stand any chance of staying up.

The fact that the Robins could still stay up is as glowing a tribute to Sean O’Driscoll’s managerial skills. Since he took over the reins, City haven’t lost at home and have kept four clean sheets in their last five outings at Ashton Gate. The damage was done earlier in the season: nine straight home games without a win under new Aberdeen boss Derek McInnes was an indication that City’s form had gone from bad to worse and even though the revival under O’Driscoll has been impressive, you get the feeling that it’s come too late to save Bristol City. One thing in the Robins’ favour: only three clubs in the Championship have scored more goals at home than City and both Steve Davies and Jonathan Stead have been in fine form recently.

If Bristol City have improved at home recently, Sheffield Wednesday have done just as well away from Hillsborough over the same period. One defeat on the road in their last eight matches has been offset by generally poor home form, which is why the Owls are still not out of the woods at the bottom of the table. Dave Jones has obviously emphasised defensive toughness on the road in recent games – five clean sheets in the last eight aways is proof of that – and on paper, this afternoon’s game looks as if it could be a nervous encounter with few goals. With five of the six league games between these two at Ashton Gate ending in 1-1 draws, I’d not be surprised if that happens again, but the hosts need more than a point to keep their hopes of survival alive.

Back again tomorrow – with the first of the single game previews that will mark the beginning of the end of the season.