Substance and Styles put Reds in play-off hunt
LOOKING UP: FOUR WINS IN A ROW CONTINUE BARNSLEY’S UNLIKELY PUSH FOR THE PREMIER LEAGUE
NINETY minutes of football did not provide a great deal to get excited about but Barnsley coach Valerien Ismael is all about outcomes, and the upshot at a subdued Oakwell was worthy of fanfare: the Reds are quietly marching on the Championshp’s play-off positions.
It is some statement about a side who had not won a league game until Ismael took charge in late October.
Beating Stoke City on a Tuesday night is a proper test of whether a second-tier team can dream of promotion. Barnsley won 2-0 and are knocking on the door of the top six.
Seventh-placed Bournemouth and Mick McCarthy’s resurgent sixth-placed Cardiff City are within striking distance from the Reds’ game in hand, fifth-placed Reading only out of it by virtue of goal difference.
“You feel the strongness of the team and the difference now,” said Ismael at full-time.
“We have more ability to adapt from the bench. It was more a game for Aapo (Halme, a secondhalf substitute), to have more strength in the midfield and in front with Victor (Adeboyejo) and (Daryl) Dike, they have more (of that) than Herbie Kane or (Conor) Chaplin.
“You have to take the decision: What do we need tonight and can we do this? Do we have the players on the bench to do this and the answer is yes, we can have an impact on the game now.
“It’s really important all the players stay involved because it will be exactly the same until the end. On Saturday (against Millwall) it will be the same game, physical, aggressiveness, duels on the pitch and you have to adapt and take the fight but the guys know now we are all ready and all adaptable.”
As Ismael emphasised before the game, his team is more about substance these days, but it does no harm to have Styles too.
Callum Styles’s goal took the early initiative and substitute Dike’s first for the club wrapped things up, beautiful bookends to an otherwise dreary evening.
There was as much drama in the warm-up as Stoke chairman Peter Coates’s helicopter noisily landed at Oakwell but it was a rare flashy moment on an evening that was never really expected to produce them, given the approach of two direct, playoff chasing sides.
Ismael did his best to yell his side into life – “Come on!” “Quicker!” “Alex, close the gap!” “Stop the cross!” – but the game rarely lifted itself beyond moribund.
It was nine minutes old when Styles grabbed it. A Callum Brittain corner came to nothing but the Potters were unable to properly get the ball away and Styles latched onto the loose ball to smash it expertly into the net.
Introduced for the final halfhour, on-loan Orlando City striker Dike looked to have blown the chance for his maiden Barnsley goal when he failed to get a clean contact on a volley as he was challenged. Twelve minutes later he latched onto a lovely passes threaded by fellow substitute Chaplin and finished neatly.
In between time, Stoke threatened to threaten, mainly when right-back Tommy Smith was on the ball, but never landed a blow. Two Angus Gunn saves in quick succession as Barnsley central midfielders Alex Mowatt and Romal Palmer tried their luck from range hinted at elevating the contest, but never delivered.
Both sides had a goal disallowed for offside – Dominik Frieser’s beautifully taken – but Barnsley never lost the control Styles gave them.
The ultra-intense Ismael has got his team on a roll but there is no danger of hurtling out of control. If he had a pound for every time he spoke about only concentrating on the next game, he could probably afford to buy the club and a couple of centre-forwards.
“When you win four times in a row and adapt to different ways to play football from your opponents, especially the last two games, it gives you confidence,” he said. “We will be ready for the game on Saturday, we know exactly what’s coming.
“I’m not worried about (complacency), they are really good guys focused on the next game.
They know the Championship is a really tough league. Brentford were 21 games unbeaten and in one week three losses in a row (the first to Barnsley) and everything changes.”
He made a rare error in his post-match press conference, seemingly not noticing as he slipped into German to talk about “what is on the tisch,” when he meant to say table. No one was going to correct him.
Forget the football – that would not be difficult – and look at the tisch. It shows Barnsley a point outside the play-offs or as Ismael would have it, two from safety.
Barnsley: Collins; Sibbick (Solbauer 85), Helik, Andersen; Brittain, Mowatt, Palmer (Halme 69), Styles; Frieser (Dike 61), Woodrow (Chaplin 85), Morris (Adeboyejo 61). Unused substitutes: Walton, Williams, Kane, Oduor. Stoke City: Gunn; Smith (Cousins 74), Batth, Souttar, Norrington-Davies; Mikel, Thompson (Allen 49); Brown (Oakley-Boothe 83), Powell, Tymon (Clarke 74); Fletcher (Vokes 49). Unused substitutes: Chester, Davies, Forrester, Norton. Referee: D Bond (Lancashire).
Do we have the players on the bench to do this and the answer is yes. Barnsley head coach Valerien Ismael on his side’s adaptability.