Omer Riza Insists Cardiff City Can Continue Upward Bounce Despite No Wins In Seven Games?
After leading Cardiff City out of the Championship relegation zone for the second time, Omer Riza thinks the team is on the rise once more.
The manager of the Bluebirds was upset that his squad was unable to cling on for their season’s first away victory over Stoke City over the weekend.
After their worst performance since he took over, Riza believes the point helped Cardiff escape the bottom three. Cardiff led 2-1 going into the 95th minute before giving up an equalizer.
Riza had moved them up four spots from last place after his interim appointment, but a 2-0 setback to Preston North End at home on Wednesday had dropped them back into the drop zone.
Anwar El Ghazi’s goal and Ben Gibson’s own goal gave them a 2-1 lead in stoppage time, giving them the appearance that they would win all three points against Stoke.
But Gibson scored for Stoke late on and it means Cardiff remain winless in seven matches.
“We’re disappointed to come away with only a point,” Riza admitted.
“We needed a reaction from the Preston game; we’ve got that, I feel.
“All the players, to a man, were excellent — from the players who started to the players who came on. We just didn’t quite do enough to secure that win.
“The Preston game was the worst performance we’ve had since I’ve been in charge — and I wasn’t happy with it at all. I made the players aware of that, and they knew that themselves.
“We went away to Coventry, and we should have won that game. We’ve come away today, and we should have won this game.
The performance was better. There’s still work to do, of course, but we’re under pressure, and we need points. That’s what I’m disappointed about more than anything today; we needed three points and we didn’t get it.”
Riza tried to spur progress by making five changes to his starting lineup, and while it almost worked, Perry Ng, a crucial defender, was conspicuously missing.
In addition to giving an explanation for Ng’s absence, Riza gave an update on midfielder David Turnbull, who will be out for a long time following surgery for a hamstring injury.
Perry’s hamstring isn’t feeling well. We’ll see where he stands. Dave Turnbull has a chronic injury because he underwent surgery on his hamstring as well.
“We’ve got a few injuries now, and the squad is a little bit thin at the moment. But the boys are doing a great job to maintain the levels that we need in order to try and get something in games.”
Stoke captain Gibson said: “It was too eventful. I’ve been unlucky, there have been three of them [own goals] now. That’s something I have to eradicate even though the last two were extremely unlucky.
“Hopefully, I’ve showed my character to bounce back and get us an equaliser, but it’s not about me, it’s about the team and we know today is really disappointing.
“We have to be better. The fans are right to moan and make their feelings felt because that [performance] isn’t good enough for this football club. There has to be more fight.”
