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Barnsley 1-1 Ipswich Town - Match Report
Saturday, 11th Mar 2017 17:15

Tom Lawrence netted a dramatic injury-time equaliser as Town grabbed a 1-1 draw at Barnsley. Marley Watkins’s 58th minute goal looked to have won it for the Tykes until Lawrence met substitute Brett Pitman’s cross deep in time added on to claim a point for the Blues, who have now drawn six on the trot.

Emyr Huws returned in midfield after his hamstring problem while manager Mick McCarthy, back at his hometown club where he started his career, recalled wing-backs Jordan Spence and Myles Kenlock.

Grant Ward dropped to the bench, as did Tommy Smith - with Jonas Knudsen moving back to the left of the three-man central defence - while Josh Emmanuel missed out on a place in the 18.

Watkins, who the Blues made an offer for last summer and McCarthy hasn’t ruled out moving for again, started on the right of midfield for the Tykes.

Spence won a corner in the opening minute which Tom Lawrence whipped in and Christophe Berra nodded wide at the near post.

Barnsley struck their first shot of the game in the sixth minute, Tom Bradshaw's pass breaking to Adam Armstrong, who hit a shot which was too close to Bartosz Bialkowski and the keeper claimed.

In the ninth minute Tykes skipper Marc Roberts turned Huws’s left-wing cross over the bar with the on-loan Cardiff man having made a bright start following his absence.

A minute later at the other end, Watkins crossed deep from the right but was unable to find a red shirt and Bialkowski and skipper Luke Chambers allowed the ball to run out.

Barnsley should have taken the lead in the 12th minute when Armstrong spurned a golden chance.

Adam Hammill was sent away in space on the Barnsley left and sent over a deep cross which Matty James volleyed into the ground at the far post, the ball bouncing up to the unmarked on-loan Newcastle striker, who nodded over from the edge of the six-yard box.

Three minutes later, a freekick was played short to Andy Yiadom not far outside the area but the full-back shot over.

It was Town’s turn to go close in the 17th minute. First, Chambers flicked Lawrence’s corner from the right well wide. Then David McGoldrick picked up the loose ball on the left and brought it round and back to the edge of the box before hitting a powerful strike which Tykes keeper Adam Davies did well to get down to block but couldn’t hold on to.

Cole Skuse was first to the loose ball but somehow Davies kept out his rebound, the midfielder having gone close to netting his second goal for the Blues for the second Saturday in succession.

As the game reached the 20-minute mark, Armstrong hit a low 25-yard effort which was easy for Bialkowski, then three minutes later Josh Scowen nodded a Hammill freekick over.


On 32 Armstrong hit a powerful strike from 30 yards which flew wide of the untroubled Bialkowski’s left post, then two minutes later Lawrence was spoken to by referee Stephen Martin after a late challenge on Yiadom but avoided a yellow card.

Soon after, Huws was also fortunate to avoid a caution for pulling back the former Barnet man as he counter-attacked having dispossessed Lawrence as he broke.

Scowen shot over for the Tykes in the 37th minute having been teed up by Hammill, then on 41 James hooked over from inside the area following a corner.

Town weren’t too far away from going in front a minute later when McGoldrick tricked his way to the byline on the left of the area and cut the ball back towards Lawrence but Angus MacDonald turned it behind, going close to netting an own goal as he did so.

Just prior to the half going into one minute of injury time Skuse picked up the game’s first yellow card for a foul on Hammill, although the Blues midfielder had appeared to be pulled back by the former Wolves man as he dispossessed him.

Barnsley had edged the first half having had more of the ball and most of the chances - although largely half-chances - even if Bialkowski was still to be seriously challenged.

Both sides had had one really good opportunity, Armstrong’s header over for the Tykes and McGoldrick’s shot and Skuse’s follow-up for the Blues, while MacDonald hadn’t been too far away from breaking the deadlock at the wrong end from McGoldrick’s cut-back.

Town had kept hold of the ball better than they had against Brentford or Wolves in spells with Huws's return making a difference but without ever really dominating.

Barnsley started the second half very much on the front foot, winning an early freekick not far outside the area, then a corner on the right after Knudsen had nodded a ball into the box wide. On 49 Watkins was fouled 25 yards out but hit his freekick straight at the wall.

Seven minutes after the restart Town switched Diagouraga for Ward, who scored a debut hat-trick against the Tykes having come on as a sub in the Blues’ 4-2 win on the opening day of the season.

A minute later, James smashed a volley from 25 yards which Bialkowski saved down to his right.

The Blues, with the wing-backs starting to get further forward than they had in the first half, started to look more threatening and on 57 Ward hit a low shot from the edge of the box which deflected wide.

From the corner McGoldrick flicked a header across goal and well wide with Chambers behind him feeling it would have reached him. And from the subsequent counter-attack the Tykes took the lead.

Watkins was played in on goal through the middle by James and took the ball into the area and beat Bialkowski as Spence’s despairing challenge came too late. The goal was very much a sucker punch with the Blues having been in their best spell of the half.

Town made their second substitution of the half on 63 with Freddie Sears coming on for Kenlock as the Blues switched to 4-4-2 with Lawrence and Ward in the wide midfield roles.

Four minutes later, Ward crossed from the right after good work from Sears, the ball looping to McGoldrick, who took a touch before smashing a shot against Scowen, who might not have been able to close down a first-time effort.

Barnsley began to put the Blues under pressure as the match moved into its final 20 minutes, James hitting a low shot through a crowd of players and wide.

McGoldrick scraped a shot well over on 76, then a minute later a deflected Lawrence strike looped into the arms of Tykes keeper Davies. The home side switched Armstrong for Ryan Williams for the final 12 minutes.

Barnsley should have made it 2-0 in the 80th minute when sub Williams fed Hammill in space to his left inside the area but Bialkowski stood his ground and saved. Skuse cleared the loose ball.

At the other end Town continued to look for an equaliser, albeit hardly convincingly, but a minute later Ward looped a header into Davies’s hands from a Sears cross from the right.

After another James volley hit powerfully but well over, Pitman replaced Huws, who had tired after the break.

As the match moved into three minutes of injury time, Ward sent Sears away down the right but the ex-Colchester man’s cross deflected into the keeper’s arms with Pitman frustrated at the far post.

Soon after McGoldrick hit a shot which was blocked with the Blues suddenly looking dangerous.

And seconds before the whistle, they grabbed an equaliser. Pitman stood up a cross from the left and Lawrence arrived late at the far post to tap home his 11th goal of the season before celebrating wildly with the Blues support behind the goal, picking up his 11th booking as a result.

There was no time for either side to look for a winner and the game ended 1-1, Town’s sixth successive draw, the second longest run in the club's history behind a seven-game drawing streak in November and December 1990.

The Blues' unbeaten run, which has now stretched to eight games, looked set to end with Barnsley having been the better side having gone in front and looking more likely to add to their lead than Town were to level. Hammill in particular will feel he should have done better with his chance.

But for all its failings, this Blues side never gives up and in the final minutes, with subs Ward, Sears and then crucially Pitman all making an impact, they began to create openings and eventually found the equaliser, scored by Lawrence, who had had another of his quieter afternoons.

The result sees Town, who have won one in 12 in all competitions, remain 16th but not only seven points from the relegation zone ahead of next Saturday’s trip to Cardiff.

Barnsley: Davies, Yiadom, Jones, Roberts (c), MacDonald, Scowen, James, Hammill, Watkins, Bradshaw, Armstrong (Williams 78). Unused: Townsend, Jackson, Mowatt, Hedges, Moncur, Kent.

Town: Bialkowski, Chambers (c), Berra, Knudsen, Spence, Skuse, Huws (Pitman 84), Diagouraga (Ward 52), Kenlock (Sears 63), McGoldrick, Lawrence. Unused: Gerken, T Smith, Pitman, Bru, Moore. Referee: Stephen Martin (Staffordshire). Att: 11,836 (Town: 742).


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paris_mitchell_in_oz added 14:25 - Mar 12
Every ounce of MM's demeanor just says "I don't give a flying $%#@ about ITFC." Getting really miffed with ME too. He doesn't seem to give two hoots either.
8

TimmyH added 14:38 - Mar 12
I see 'bonehead' is out the day after with the down marks, no surprise there. Sadly an enemy of the club if he supports McCarthy as the future of the club certainly doesn't lay with him.
10

battyblue added 16:37 - Mar 12
A sixteen year old scores twice for Fulham yesterday against Newcastle,,it would never happen to us with Dino in charge though have to be proper blokes to get in his team. The one point wonder will be setting up not to get beat v Cardiff again with his eight defensive proper blokes on parade.

Hasn't a clue this bloke time he was on his bike...Mick out
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Sam added 16:47 - Mar 12
Town need to watch where Gary Rowett goes now cause there's a chance he'll go to Norwich then who? Warburton? Mick out NOW!!
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warktheline added 16:55 - Mar 12
Couldn't sum up the energy or motivation to post! Watched my boy win man of the match this morning, and that's lifted my morale !
So poor old Evans is losing 6 million a year! So answer me this, why oh why did he decide to take the club over? For the fun of it, or just to save us? Bloody clueless some are on here!
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grumpyoldman added 16:57 - Mar 12
In my last post I mentioned the Paul Mariner transfer the costs of Paul Cooper & Allan Hunter which are a matter of record, I mentioned the rest of the team came through our youth system, all facts. I went on to compare the way we played, not just setting out not to lose like the present regime. All facts not opinions and still Swn98 marks me down, so he not only argues about opinions but questions stated facts, priceless!
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BillBlue added 17:02 - Mar 12
Absolutely super Mickszzzzzz! I don't think I did too badly for a very old bloke whose memory has gone to blazes, only £25k out from the top price although we all knew it was less than that because of the other players involved in the deal and, yes, Trevor Francis was the name I couldn't remember (my memory tells me that was before the PM deal but I am obviously wrong) and the Notts Forest Manager came from Derby and I wasn't sure if he was at Derby or Notts Forest first. OK? Good research too Seasider.
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BillBlue added 17:19 - Mar 12
Grumpyoldman- whatever you do do not let that idiot get to you, in spite of his poses I think he is a genuine imbecile and only worth totally ignoring. There have been two or three like that since I first started reading this board. Two years reading it before I joined which I did in an unsuccessful attempt to stop McCarthy coming here so that is a total of six years and, IMO, this is the worst one by far, so just ignore him. A lot of people appear to like your posts, as do I and that is important, nothing else!
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MicksZzzTactics added 17:21 - Mar 12
@ Seasider

Not that I have any reasons to doubt your quote personal "records" per say dear @Seasider... but basically only because you did nevertheless express a certain amount of doubt in your above reply, I then decided to try and dig little deeper by way of The Net (and ohhh also if I hadn't well this not overly exciting-to-watch Liverpool-Burnley contest might literally pretty soon have rolled me to sleep! :-) lol) to see if I could find some form of confirmation on this somewhat tricky to dissect 3-player-deal.

Well apart from PM's very open-source (everyone can edit it) own WIKI page which just say "220, 000" (but doesn't bother to specify whether that was net or gross i.e. BEFORE possibly deducting the values of Peddelty & Atkins from the deal) well then it seems to me that sadly there is be very little printed media stuff on the business matters of football kept from that time ..... UNTIL I came to think along the lines of memorabilia & collectors Items .... and Voila! just now stumbled across this here wonderful full colored pdf file of the glorious 1979 FA Cup final 50 Pence official souvenir program!!!

http://www.thearsenalhistory.com/progs/197778/19780506FAC.pdf

And on page 19 of this wonderful thing it also here says: "£ 220,000 record fee" which thus give me more reasons to believe that this amount (or possibly more precisely your mentioned 225,000) is indeed in fact the NET FIGURE (i.e. incl. the values of Peddelty & Atkins ) basically since this program is made by the English FA!, which imo obviously must have detailed contractual info of this here 1976 deal.

Your thoughts please???
2

blueboy1981 added 18:43 - Mar 12
Swn98 ........ go to sleep - or defect - you're so, so boring.
6

OldClactonBlue added 20:23 - Mar 12
McCarthy out
Evans out
Milne out
L
7

OldClactonBlue added 20:24 - Mar 12
McCarthy out
Evans out
Milne out
1

bobble added 20:41 - Mar 12
its never been so easy to predict the results and first scorer not since the dark lord and his 1-0 losses and 0-0 draws and occasional 1-0 win...its take us 6 years to get back to where we were with a more boring style of football to boot...
2

wayway added 21:09 - Mar 12
Warktheline has asked the very question nobody else on here seems to ask. Why did Evans buy the club? So he is pumping 6 million of his vast fortune to keep the club afloat, is that the limit of his ambition or does his motives lie in a different direction. He is obviously not interested in I T F C or football in general so WHY? My theory for the last 4 years is that somehow he writes down the club losses against his other companies thus to avoid paying tax, remember not adverse to sharp practice as the world cup ticket scam proved. As much as I dislike that lot up the road you have to admire their board of directors for taking action when they knew the manager had taken them as far as he could. It is pointless asking how long McCarthey would have lasted at Norwich because they would never appointed someone like him in the first place. He wont sack McCarthy because he gives him what he wants, no hassle, and why would McCarthy resign being on such a good thing. The drop in season ticket sales will not make any difference as that will mean we sell more players to offset the loss and on we go with more free transfers and loans for next season. I wish I could see light at the end of the tunnel but I can see us in the same boat as Coventry next season
1

grumpyoldman added 21:33 - Mar 12
Billblue whatever Swn98 does will never effect me I jus thought it showed him in his true light, if he disagrees with you once he marks you down out of habit without actually reading what you post
2

MicksZzzTactics added 21:55 - Mar 12
@Seasider my good sir, I've been giving this tricky-to-dissect 3-player deal just a little more thought since my latest post, and basically it might possibly be boiled down to "semantics" in a screwed way, dont you agree??? :-) lol

Alas to close this issue once and for all and of course also pleaZzze the wannabe ITFC Football Historian :-) and/or & extreme detail-picky among :-) our fans to whom it might matter an awful lot that either Mariner was as an individual LITERALLY bought/transferred for a club record £ 220,000-225,000 or he wasn't!!!!!!!!! (And if he wasn't well then that means several or all of the sources I've come across are wrong and should have read either: A) "£ 125,000" or B) "£ 220,000 MINUS the £ 100,000 in combined price of Mr. Peddelty & Mr. Atkins going the other way") I have come up with a little theory:

Thus IMHO what might simply have happened with/or at The FA and with the indivuidual licens & paperwork etc. relating to these 3 players on that day in October 1976 is this:
Firstly Mariner was indeed sold and transfered for £ 220,000 (personally I don't doubt for a sec that one as super gifted as him wouldn't possibly be individually valued as high as that) ... and then a mere "couple of minutes later" so to speak :-) Mr. Peddelty & Mr. Atkins went from ITFC to Plymmouth for around £ 100,000 combined.

I any event that's my best CLOSING bet on this matter @Seasider, as I'm not confident that it can ever be ascertanined whether figuratively £ 220,0000-£ 225,0000 was ever "withdrawn" like on the Cobbold's ITFC account that day or whether it only was in the region of £ 125,000 as you originally suggested.

PS: BTW I found -- or rediscovered rather -- another source for the transfer price tags and much much more ... and it is of course the good old site "PRIDE OF ANGLIA" (now residing at this newish web address: prideofanglia.com). How I originally could have forgotten about them in this here specific debate in really don't know! :-) lol, as among many awesome things they strive to list thisand other details on EVERY player who ever wore the shirt! Anyhow even they list Mariner's fee at £ 220,000, Peddelty's at £ 50,000 at Austins's at £ 50,000.
1

alfromcol added 22:24 - Mar 12
McClaren is available AGAIN
1

bbg added 23:02 - Mar 12
Grumpyoldman & Billblue: It appears that the Mariner fee as a % of the then transfer record would in today's terms would be closer to £60m. Furthermore I think most people would agree that the main catalysts for the stylish football & the successful period during late 70's and early 80's were Thijssen and Mariner, who both cost six figure fees amounting to between 30 — 40% of the then record fee paid by an English at that point, the equivalent of over £30m today.

You are correct that most of the players came through the youth system, and that was true for all clubs during that era.

I think in assessing the current team and management and comparing the current style of play and league position to past teams, it is only fair to consider the lack of investment and our complete inability to compete with even Championship clubs in that regard, unlike during the late 70's and early 80's when we clearly could financially compete with the biggest clubs in the country.
-3

grumpyoldman added 08:18 - Mar 13
Bbg because there was no tv money available at the time how can you say what we spent on Mariner was equal to £60 millilion, inflation has not risen enough to justify that figure. My point has not changed always setting out not to lose is not the same as trying to win. Royle, Burley, Magilton, Ferguson, Lyall, Ramsey and the rest, name one of them who set their teams up not to lose on a regular basis? I know we will never again be able to compete with the big clubs again all I ask is for is a team at least set up to try and win.
5

Dissboyitfc added 08:20 - Mar 13
bbg i only need to think of the lincoln debacle to compare now and then. Not once has mick set out to win and win well against anybody. He doesnt even fancy us to do a job on non league teams!

Our greatest player ever was Kevin Beatie, valued at what in todays Market? £60,000,000. How much did we pay for him?

Football has changed, but the lack of funding for first team does not mean lack of entertainment. Other teams Manage it, how much have Barnsley spent for instance.

Someone asked the other day,"is this the worst team ever, i dont think it is. It is without the most boring negative team ever, i dont remember any other managers setting out to draw every game, even John Duncans teams wanted to win!

In fact lets compare now to BFJ's time in charge, Joe had even tighter funds, but boy we competed and it was fun and a joy.

THERE ARE NO EXCUSES FOR THE RUBBISH SERVED UP EVERY SINGLE GAME!
5

Dissboyitfc added 08:22 - Mar 13
Grumpyold man... well said, you took the words outof my mouth.lol.
2


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