Turning A Corner

Cardiff City's impressive 1-3 win over strugglers Rotherham away from home on Tuesday night was yet more evidence that slowly but surely the bluebirds are turning a corner. Just under 400 city fans made the long journey to the New York Stadium on a bitter cold Tuesday evening and their loyalty was rewarded with Bruno Ecuele Manga, Kiko Macheda and Conor McAleny goals giving city another precious victory on the road, which surely cements our championship safety.
People will say "oh it's only Rotherham away", but you can only beat what is in front of you and if you go to any ground in the league and are 0-3 up within 40 minutes then you will be extremely happy. It's no difference here. I think my eyes nearly feel out of my head when I checked my ipad to see the score. I went on another site just to check the score was actually real when we went 0-3 up.
It's satisfying to finally look back at a city match and be able to say that we thoroughly deserved the win and it was never really in doubt, which I think is certainly the case here. 2 of the goals were fine finishes, especially Macheda's who normally draws a lot of criticism from me and many others. But there I no doubting that his hooked volley to give us a commanding 0-2 lead was one of the best I've seen from a city player all season.
Another man who has also drawn a lot of criticism from me is bluebirds manager Russell Slade, but credit where credit is due, we had a game plan on Tuesday that was masterminded by him and it worked. Yes, new head coach Paul Trollope has been a breath of fresh air, but credit also has to go to Slade for some of the recent results. His style of football is normally frustrating to say the least, but if he can keep results like this up then I will give him more time in the hot seat.
Aside from the tremendous result on Tuesday, another hot topic this week has been the idea of more cost-cutting taking place in the summer transfer window. Now don't get me wrong, I want this club to develop and keep good players, but this season some of our high earners just haven't performed to the levels that we should expect. David Marshall has been solid this year, but his deputy Simon Moore has proved that he could do a fine job if he was to leave. We could make a handy 4 million at least from that sale. Craig Nonne has hardly had one good game for us this season, and with a 2 million offer coming in from Norwich in the last window, more money could be made from that. Peter Whittingham has been another player that has been poor this year, and in Stuart O Keefe, Joe Ralls and Tom Adeyami, we have perfectly capable young talent that could attempt to fill his boots.
Anyway, next up for the bluebirds is a home game against Charlton on Saturday. I think it would be unfair to the lads that did a superb job on Tuesday, so I would like Slade to go with a similar team for this clash. Before the end of the season, I would also like more young players to wear the blue shirt to give them a chance to prove that they have futures.
Before I finish this blog, I would just like to give my well wishes to Swansea City striker Bafetimbi Gomis who suddenly collapsed in a premier league game on Wednesday. We may be huge rivals, but I don't wish to see any players health decreasing on the football pitch. Best wishes Bafe