Bradford City 1 Carlisle United 0: Carlisle are still in this – that much is clear after this tense, high-energy, frustrating, compelling first leg. How far they are in it depends on their ability to score.
That has not been their strongest suit in recent weeks and, for all their good endeavours at Valley Parade, cost them last night. To turn this around they’ll now somehow have to find an edge they couldn’t at Bradford.
They can. They could. One-nil is a thin margin indeed, as anyone who’s taken even a passing interest in the play-offs knows. This might not have been the ideal outcome but it’s far from a disaster.
It simply now falls to Paul Simpson’s side to summon better goalscoring reserves. They had their chances here, Ryan Edmondson with the best of them, and their season now hinges on better clarity when the posts, net and crossbar come into their sights.
Other aspects of their play, bar the crumbly defending of the only goal, were good on this big stage. Their use of the ball improved, their ability to create – as opposed to force – chances got better the longer it went on.
So there was ample reason for Simpson to feel bright of mood as Carlisle’s team coach turned away from west Yorkshire. The hope now is simply that the need to chase a small deficit brings the Blues into an irresistible gallop on home turf.
Bradford have not won at Brunton Park since 1985, but now don’t have to. Their advantage is minor, but real. Jamie Walker supplied the once piece of devil across 95 minutes and Mark Hughes’ side will travel to Cumbria feeling they are strong enough to consolidate that.
Perhaps they will when the roaring expectation of 20,000 fans is not bearing down on them. Or maybe they’ll blink as they nearly did here. Hughes’ side grew increasingly anxious on top of their lead at Valley Parade as Carlisle gained composure, jumped on mistakes, built passages of play, tested the hosts with set-pieces…did everything but the bit they now can’t go without for a single game more.
Be wary of anyone who feels they can confidently call this. After 46, and now 47 games, it's still so precarious, so hard to pin down.
Beforehand last night, it was as play-off occasions are meant to feel: a light spring evening, warmth in the Yorkshire air, a hum of activity outside, the heart-thump of anticipation inside.
Sky Sports personnel beetled around. Greg Abbott, Carlisle’s head of recruitment and a long-standing favourite in these parts, held court with some familiar faces. Hughes, in his shirt-sleeves, strode purposefully to his dugout. There were more than two hours still to go.
It always takes some processing that this large, historic ground is a fourth-tier venue, more so when it’s as packed as it was here for League Two’s biggest ever play-off semi-final attendance. That included 2,415 Carlisle fans who, with their blue shirts and flags and Simmo-faith and bellies fortified with #peeve and a yearning for a first promotion in 17 years, gradually became a more frequent sight as kick-off approached.
Simpson’s team sheet shone bright light on how he wanted to approach these first semi-final exchanges: the right-sided balance of Joel Senior returning, and the experience/physicality/needle of Joe Garner up front.
All of that duly arrived in a first half which was maddening in different ways. In the nervy early stages, there were ragged and heavy touches before a few patterns emerged. One involved Bradford happily pinging the ball down the right and asking Andy Cook, the division's best, biggest and most ominous goalscorer, to put pressure on Paul Huntington. Another involved Scott Banks seeking space to run at United’s left defensive side.
Carlisle’s first grounds to grumble at Ross Joyce, a referee branded a “homer” by Simpson, was when Alfie McCalmont – their busiest player across the piece – bustled in from the right and eventually went down in the box with his back to Sam Stubbs. Nothing doing from the official. Hmm.
From the next spell of to and fro, the opening goal arrived. Garner dipped a shot against the bar (it was pulled back for a Bradford free-kick) yet then the hosts found United too fragile down the middle as, after keeping a long ball alive, they found Walker sharper than Jack Armer as he fizzed a low shot under Tomas Holy.
As well as the cue for loud noise around the ground it was also an excuse for a numpty to charge from the stands onto the pitch. He was duly detained. Carlisle then looked to remove their own shackles.
They looked to Garner to lead this bid, the striker going through his usual repertoire but not, as things went on, getting a penny of change from official Joyce as Bradford approached him in heavy-handed way. Walker zipped a shot wide at the other end and, as Carlisle built some better possession, one wondered if Garner could have spent just a little less time looking for decisions and a shade more on his feet, primed for chances – not least with Joyce clearly not leaning the Cumbrians' way.
Owen Moxon’s set-pieces were of a premium standard, but Simpson’s side lacked a killer opportunity, Omari Patrick failing to release the ball after dashing into a good position down the left, and then Holy sharply denying the speedy Banks as the half ticked down.
After the break, Cook saw a shot deflected wide – one of the few times his eyes lit up at the sight of the target amid Huntington’s attentive defending. Patrick and Garner were then replaced by Kristian Dennis and Edmondson as Carlisle sought fresh poise in the danger zone.
Another corner from Moxon - who was excellent once more on this stage - lacked the final thrust and then Edmondson, after brightly engineering a chance on the right, found the angle too tight for his right-footed attempt. A further Moxon corner to Corey Whelan went begging as Carlisle came onto Bradford with a rumble that was aided by Taylor Charters' intelligent offerings in a substitute cameo.
Huntington then prevented Cook from doubling the hosts’ lead…then Edmondson blew United’s chance of the night, heading Armer’s perfect cross over the bar. It should have gone in.
The hosts appeared hasty in possession, nervously unwilling and unable to seize things. Carlisle, though, could not take full advantage, Dennis missing a late chance, Bradford unable to kill it themselves, the whole shooting match very hard to call – leaving it down to the actual shooting, you have to think, at Brunton Park.
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