First thing to say is a belated Happy New Year to everyone of a Royal Blue persuasion. January has greeted us with bitterly cold weather and our first serious snow. Storm Goretti has caused mayhem in many parts of the country including our native Midlands. Our players travelled down to Cambridge on Friday not certain that the game would go ahead. A pitch inspection at midday put paid to any doubts and it was game on. A later kick off meant that I didn’t leave home until about 2.30 pm. I had just watched Crystal Palace get knocked out of the Cup by sixth tier, Macclesfield FC so if anyone was in any doubt of the jeopardy facing Blues against Cambridge United, that result would surely have disavowed them!
I was the only one of my usual gang to acquire a ticket, kindly donated by Jacob, top lad of Sussex Blues OSC of which I am a member. My journey up was quite pleasant with bright sunshine, dry roads and only light traffic. It was dark by the time I reached the park and ride car park at Newmarket Road and for the princely sum of £3.50 I got on the bus to the ground and arrived just in time for kick off.
It was a cold night and there was a mist already beginning to descend. The away end is at least twenty to twenty five yards from the edge of the pitch behind the goal so the opposite end appeared through the mist, a long way away. The visibility which had been excellent on my journey was already showing signs of deterioration. Despite the floodlights I was having problems identifying individual players apart from those with striking features such as Kyogo, Klarer, Iwata or Ducksch. The further up the pitch they were, the more difficult it became and for that reason I won’t be giving the players or officials an assessment score. One amusing moment occurred early on when the scoreboard suddenly showed that we were 1-0 up despite the fact that we hadn’t scored! Chants of “We’ve scored a goal, we’ve scored a goal” rang out from our contingent and when eventually, the scoreboard was corrected, the chant changed to “We want our goal back, we want our goal back” much to the mirth of everyone. We were fortunate not to be behind early on when Cambridge’s Ben Knight blazed over when well placed bang in front of goal from ten yards out after ineffectual ping pong defending from us on the half hour.
It wasn’t long however, a minute to be exact, before it was 1-0 to Blues. I didn’t really make out the details but having watched the playback footage, a clipped ball into the box was headed across the area by a defender to Ducksch who tried to square to Kyogo but his marker got a toe to it and it went back out to the inside left channel where Kai Wagner was on hand with a first time shot. After a deflection off a defender the ball was in the back of the net. Kyogo and Ducksch linked up well a few minutes later with the Japanese player putting his striking partner in but the big German couldn’t get the ball out of his feet sufficiently to get an effective enough strike with his left foot and the strike went straight at Eastwood in the Cambridge goal. A second Blues goal followed within a couple of minutes when following a Blues clearance, Kyogo caught the Cambridge centre-half dithering and showed him a clean pair of heels. Clean through and one on one with Eastwood, we all held our breath but Kyogo made no mistake slotting home past the keeper’s left hand. This got the biggest cheer of the night as we have all been willing the little fella to score. Hopefully, now that he has, more will follow in the Championship.
Half time and it was time for a bacon roll and some chips. Fortified, the second half started and Kyogo was so close to doubling his tally early on with a lovely lob over Eastwood from 25 yards which unfortunately clipped the upright. Blues seemed to lose control of the game at this point and Cambridge enjoyed a long spell of pressure without really threatening. Ben Knight repeated his trick from the rugby playbook by blazing over their best chance from a similar position to the first half. The home side were to rue this profligacy when with 78 minutes gone Tommy Doyle fed a beautifully weighted ball through to Ducksch just inside the area. The German didn’t have to break stride and passed the ball into the bottom right hand corner past the helpless keeper for 3-0.
That, you would think, would be that but this is Blues we are talking about. Eighty minutes gone and cruising. What could possibly go wrong? As no doubt, you will know, Blues contrived to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory – well almost! Conceding two goals in the last ten minutes making for a nervy time added on was bordering on criminal. I hadn’t a clue what was going on at the other end of the pitch at this stage as the opposite goal was barely visible but we were aware of ghostly shapes celebrating and the noise from the opposite end. Both goals by Sullay Kaikai were down to rank bad defending but I suppose we shouldn’t complain too much, they did after all gift us a couple. Look this wasn’t the best game in the world and it’s not one that will linger fondly in the memory but we won and that is all that matters in the Cup. We’re in the hat; let’s hope for a good draw in the fourth round.
The Good: We won, avoided an embarrassing banana skin and we have the fourth round to look forward to. The fact that Kyogo scored. Hopefully, this will give him confidence.
The Bad: The visibility. This game would have been a better spectacle played at 3 pm when the sun was shining and the visibility was excellent.
The Ugly: The prospect of extra time! It was a cold, damp night with condensation coming from the river Cam and the fens. The fog would only have got worse!
Cambridge United: Jake Eastwood, Liam Bennett, Dominic Ball (Shayne Lavery 63) James Brophy (Sullay Kaikai 63) Louis Appere, Ben Knight, Zeno Rossi, Pelly Mpanzu (Shane McLoughlin 74) Marmadou Jobe, James Gibbons (Ben Purrington 74) George Hoddle.
Subs not used: Ben Hughes, Michael Morrison, Elias Kachunga, Glenn McConnell, Lohan McDougald.
Goals: Kaikai 80, 89.
Yellow cards: Hoddle 88
Birmingham City: James Beadle, Tomoki Iwata, Christoph Klarer, Jack Robinson (Phil Neumann 77) Kai Wagner, Paik Seung-ho, Tommy Doyle, Lewis Koumas (Alfons Sampsted 90) Patrick Roberts (Willum Willumsson 75) Marvin Ducksch, Kyogo Furuhashi (Kanya Fujimoto 75)
Subs not used: Ryan Allsop, Briar Bateman, Menzi Mazwi, Billy Burrell, Daniel Isichei.
Goals: Wagner 31, Furuhashi 44, Ducksch 78.
Yellow cards: None
Referee: Matt Corlett.
Attendance: 6,241 (1,447 bluenoses)
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