Dyer: Tight Play-Off Derbies Could Go to Penalties Wednesday, 6th May 2015 19:45 Kieron Dyer expects Town’s Championship play-off semi-finals against Norwich City to be tight affairs which could even go all the way to penalties, with the Blues ultimately emerging the victors. Town face their greatest rivals in the first leg at Portman Road on Saturday with the return at Carrow Road a week later. Ipswich-born Dyer would be pleased with a draw in the home game given the Blues’ strengths: “I would be happy enough with a draw from the first leg. As a team, the way we set out, we’re not a team that can go out and dominate possession. “We’re always a team who are hard to beat, we’re great on the counter-attack and our strikers are fantastic at what they do, they chase lost causes, they turn teams over.” He says the Blues are less effective when forced to take games to the opposition: “Middlesbrough away springs to mind. Middlesbrough were 2-1 up and we had to go and get a result and we left ourselves open. “That game could have been 6-1 or 7-1 with the number of chances Patrick Bamford had. Hopefully we’ll give ourselves a chance in the second leg where we can still be solid and compact and play to our advantage. “I honestly believe that both legs will be the same scoreline and it’ll go to penalties and I fancy Teddy Bishop to score the winner. That’s my prediction. I think they’ll both be tight games.” Reflecting on the stress of that scenario, he added: “At least we don’t have to go for it at Wembley, that would have been worse!” Earlier in the season Dyer had anticipated a Wembley derby showdown: “When I was on Life’s a Pitch before the Middlesbrough home game I said that it wouldn’t surprise me if we ended up with a Wembley shoot-out. “You just had that feeling that as soon as Neil Adams was gone at Norwich. But since then, to be fair to them, they’ve probably been the most in-form team during the second half of the season. “It just looked that way and now it’s a tie not just for bragging rights, there’s a lot more than that, there’s the chance of being with the big boys again.” While he would be delighted to see the Blues claim a narrow lead from the first game, he warns that, much like Saturday at Ewood Park, it wouldn’t be easy going into the second match needing to cling onto that advantage. “I did predict that Blackburn would beat us,” he added. “The hardest thing for a footballer is going into a game knowing that you don’t have to win. “You saw that with Chelsea in the Champions League when they only needed a draw with Paris St Germain. “I know everyone would take a 1-0 win on Saturday but then we’d go into the second leg knowing we don’t have win and that once you set up that way and then lose a couple of goals it’s then hard to get out of that mindset.” Following his retirement as a player in the summer of 2013, Dyer began coaching part-time back at the academy, working with the U16s, but has recently put that on the back burner, finding himself doing more paperwork than coaching as he sought to earn his coaching badges. He says he plans a reunion with former Town team-mate Jim Magilton, now the elite performance director with the [Northern] Irish Football Association, in the summer. “I took a back step after Christmas but Jim runs a fast-track course where you can get your UEFA B and A Licences over a two-week period, so I that’s something I’ll be looking to be doing.” Prior to Magilton’s famous hat-trick against Bolton helping the Blues to Wembley and then the Premier League in 1999/00, Dyer was part of three Town sides which lost out in the play-off semi-finals, the Blues going into those games in differing frames of mind, but with the same outcome. “I’ve gone into play-offs where we started off the season terribly and then gone on an unbelievable run. I think it was the season where we played Charlton having finished fifth [1997/98]. “Having been near the bottom of the league for the first 10 games, we had all the momentum and confidence and yet we lost [2-0 on aggregate]. “And then we had it the other way where we went into the play-offs so disappointed when we should have gone up automatically but Bradford pipped us and again we went out [1998/99].
“So I think form guides [can go out the window], I think it’s just whoever performs best in the two games, and even that’s not a given. “In my last season with Ipswich Bolton beat us 1-0 at their place and we were the better team. “In the game at home we battered them and had chances and we were the better team again [but lost 4-3], so sometimes you need a bit of luck. “The season after I left and we went up, Bolton were probably the better team at Portman Road that day but we went up because of Jim’s hat-trick.” Given his own play-off experiences, it’s no surprise Dyer is no fan: “I hate the play-offs for obvious reasons. I know it’s worked out that Ipswich have come sixth but I’ve always said that there should be an advantage for the team that comes third, they should be guaranteed their spot at Wembley. “And then the fourth and fifth-placed teams have a one-off game at the fourth-placed team’s home ground so you have an actual advantage. Obviously Ipswich would miss out, so it’s worked out quite well for them this year. “But I always think the play-offs should be done that way because when we finished third in my last season I think we were 10 points ahead of Bolton. “We were miles better than them in the season and then the only advantage we get is to get the second leg at home, which is not really an advantage.” While there will be much talk about pressure in the run-up to the games, he says players don’t really feel it once the referee blows his whistle: “For me pressure was before the game. “Whatever problems you have, whatever nervousness you have, once you get on the pitch it’s like you’re escaping from it. At least it always was for me. “The only part when you get nervous is the build-up to the match. For me as a player when you finally get out there it was like an escape, going into an arena where you’re most comfortable and where you know you’re a good player. “I was at the [Floyd Mayweather-Manny Pacquiao] boxing match on Saturday and it was the same. It was dubbed the ‘Fight of the Century’ but as soon as they got inside the ring there was absolutely no pressure on them and they just performed.” Dyer is a big fan of Blues boss Mick McCarthy: ”I’m always singing Mick’s tune. I know he’s rubbed some fans up the wrong way with his style of football but it’s effective. People criticise Jose Mourinho for his style of play but he wins things. “Mick’s a winner, we may wish it was a bit prettier at times but we probably wouldn’t be in the play-offs, so you can’t have it both ways.” The 36-year-old dismisses claims that the Canaries have a much superior squad going into what are probably the biggest East Anglian derbies ever: “I don’t think they have got better players than us. “I think they’ve got probably one of the strongest midfields in the league, the midfield is exceptionally strong with Bradley Johnson, Wes Hoolahan, I think Nathan Redmond will definitely play in the Premier League one day. “But would you take their strikers over our strikers? I don’t know the latest with David McGoldrick, whether he’s got a chance of being on the bench, but if you’ve got McGoldrick, Murphy, Searsy and Varney, who can play there as well, that’s very strong. “Our back four on their day is very strong, solid and compact. On paper, it’s not as big a mismatch as everyone’s saying.”
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