A remarkable late show in Barrow offers Bradford City a remarkable late shot of promotion

24/04/2024 00:21

By Jason McKeown

Well, well, well. Somehow, against all the odds – and after most of us had long since written off their chances – Bradford City will go into the final game of this difficult season still in with a chance of the play offs. Victory here in Barrow – a fifth success in the last six – sets up a last day showdown, where beating an out of sorts Newport County will give them every chance of finishing inside the play offs. Especially with an increasingly frail Barrow – beaten here, and now with just one point from their last 18 – nervously trying to crawl over the line in a tough home game against promoted Mansfield.

The clock stood at 89 minutes and 53 seconds when Andy Cook played Tyler Smith through on goal. Smith – with just one goal in his last 17 outings – has missed far simpler chances in recent weeks, and it was easy to fear the worst. But the 25-year-old ran through and bent a lovely curling shot past home goalkeeper Paul Farman and into the bottom corner of the net. By some distance, this was the most dramatic goal in Bradford City's season – and it’s one that might yet go down in Bantams' folklore. As it stood until Smith’s shot crossed the line – the clock now at 89 minutes and 56 seconds – City were guaranteed to be in next season's League Two.

They think it's all over. And, well, actually it isn't.

Ahead of this weekend's final League Two round of fixtures, three of the four play off places are still up for grabs. For City, the equation is a little simpler at least. Only the final, seventh spot can be reached – the position Barrow are unconvincingly clinging onto. A win for the Bantams and defeat for Barrow would see the two swap positions. Crawley – who end the season at home to 21st-place Grimsby – are first in the queue to take advantage of any further Barrow slip ups, but if they don't win and Barrow lose, City can claim that final play off spot by defeating Newport.  

It’s crazy, makes little sense and yet here we are. Barrow have being a permanent fixture in the top seven ever since 11 November – the day they beat Bradford City 2-1 at Valley Parade in Graham Alexander's first game in charge. The Bantams are now 9th in the league, and have not spent a single minute of this campaign inside the play off positions. They still have a bloomin’ negative goal difference! It would be an incredible turn of events for City to jump into the top seven for the first time on Saturday, just as the music stops. And yet, there's now every chance this could happen.

This was a night to glean so much confidence ahead of that last day shootout, whilst at the same time further draining Barrow of theirs. City played well for long periods, especially in the first half where they really should have been out of sight. And though Barrow came roaring back after the break and threatened to seal their own play off spot, the Bantams ultimately stood up to some strong second half pressure, and Alexander showed commendable bravery to make positive changes from the bench that won the game.

It was a good performance from City, who in the first half especially pressed Barrow when out of possession and never allowed an edgy home side to settle. At times Barrow couldn't get out their own half and they were indebted to Farman saving headed attempts from Ciaran Kelly and Cook. Calum Kavanagh missed the best early chance of the lot, with the ball suddenly rolling into his path after good pressing from Brad Halliday, only to screw his shot wide of the far post with just Farman to beat. Cook was in a great position alongside Kavanagh, and squaring the ball to City's top scorer might have been the better option.

Still, City did get the goal their dominance deserved when a Richie Smallwood corner was cleared to Bobby Pointon just inside the penalty area. The 20-year-old took a touch to steady the ball before unleashing a ferocious strike that flew past a crowd of bodies and into the back of the net. A truly brilliant goal from a brilliant young prospect. How much of a better position might the Bantams be in right now if Alexander had not overlooked Pointon for so long?

When shortly after Kavanagh was given another sight of goal thanks to some awful defending – only to shoot tamely at Farman – it seemed clear that City had to take greater advantage of their dominance by getting a second goal. Barrow began to gradually come into the game as the half drew to a close, but they were on the ropes and there for the taking. City could have been left to greatly rue the fact that they let them off the hook.

Barrow couldn't really play any worse in the second half, and Pete Wild's half time words clearly saw the home side remerge fired up and full of urgency. Cole Stockton saw an effort cleared off the line by Kelly after managing to get round Sam Walker, but having a tight angle to shoot from. It wasn't the most convincing piece of goalkeeping from Walker, and sadly a sign of things to come.

For just on the hour, Barrow equalised. Kelly caught Stockton with a challenge that saw the Irishman injure himself. The resultant free kick from Kian Spence was struck from a long way out, wasn't exactly a thunderbolt, but it deflected off a pretty flimsy-looking City wall and edged past Walker, who should really have saved it. And from there Barrow took charge. Balls pumped into the City box from all angles. Some admirable City defending to thwart Barrow's directness, but there was little let up. For a period, the visitors were hanging on.

But still, City got through it. They ultimately took the sting out of Barrow's momentum. Slowed the game down. And with the arrival of Clarke Oduor, Harry Chapman and Smith from the bench for the tiring Alex Gilliead, Kavanagh and Pointon, they got a second wind. Moments before Smith struck, Chapman had got free out wide and sent over a delicious cross that prompted a Gazza-at-Euro-96-style-lunge for the ball from Smith where he agonisingly failed to connect. The ball went out for a throw in, the excellent Tyreik Wright and then Chapman won aerial challenges from it, and then there was Cook to send Smith away to win the game.

Six minutes of stoppage time were announced, which stretched into almost nine nerve jangling minutes of late Barrow pressure. Free kicks and corners pumped into the box, but more heroic defending from a backline that did an amazing job. Alexander successfully shored things up by introducing Jon Tomkinson and Lewis Richards. The fact he had to sub off the subs Chapman and Smith – barely 10 minutes after they had come on – was unusual, deeply pragmatic, but ultimately vindicated. Cue the full time celebrations of players in front of the corner of the Holker Street Stadium that housed the disbelieving visiting supporters.

There's a lot of weird emotions here to explore. But first, let's give City credit for what they've just achieved. This win stretches their unbeaten run to six games. They've regained an awful lot of pride that had been stripped away in March, when opposition teams were queuing up to humiliate them. Who would have thought that their horrendous 3-0 thumping to Harrogate Town, exactly a month ago, is now just one game away from proving to be their last of the regular season? City slumped to 17th in League Two that day, some nine points off the top seven. They were 14 points behind Barrow – the side they can now overtake and pip to the play offs – having played a game more.

Saturday is going to be nervy, edgy and tense – but above all else, it's going to be exciting. This is a chance that we thought was long gone. A bonus. A free hit. The margins are still very thin. The odds are still against City. And if they come up short, it won't hurt in the way that it will if you're a Barrow fan who misses out from here.

That said, it's difficult to fully work out how to feel about this. The league table doesn't lie after 46 games of course, but for most of this season Bradford City have massively underachieved, underperformed and left us all feeling incredibly down and frustrated. It's difficult to argue they deserve to finish inside the top seven, less so that they deserve to be promoted. The experience of watching Carlisle United from a distance this season (and Forest Green the year before) is also slightly worrying. Are Bradford City really equipped to play in League One next season? Going up would be nice, but might be counterproductive.

Promotion seasons don't come around very often, especially in these parts, and it would be incredibly ungrateful to bemoan going up at Wembley in just over a month's time. But this does not feel like a promotion season. We do not have a collection of brilliant memories picked up along the journey, in the same way the promotion seasons of 2012/13, 1998/99, 1995/96, 1984/85 etc are full of treasured moments that are fondly remembered. This is still not a football club united and together.

I think above all else, most of us had mentally checked out this season. Some fans I know haven't been to a game since January. Others stopped going in March during that awful week. Even for those of us who still turn up, the last few weeks have felt more akin to winding down and looking forward to a summer break, the anger of City's seeming failure to push for promotion something we'd moved past. All that was left to do this season, it seemed, was perform the post mortem. Now, we're having to double check we haven't made any plans on the May bank holiday weekend, knowing that suddenly we might need to be prepping ourselves for a trip to Wembley.

It’s just all a bit surreal. Cold hard logic determined the season was over. Weeks ago! These end of season wins were little more than a nice ending. Nothing to take too seriously or get too excited over. And yet now, we have to turn back on the tap of fully charged emotions. Be gripped by a football supporting anxiety that has been absent at Valley Parade for weeks. I feel really oddly nervous about Saturday. After months of being dosed repeatedly by cold hard reality, we can suddenly dare to dream.

It’s going to be a really interesting atmosphere on Saturday. Do we turn up biting our nails, glued to our phones for score updates and singing ourselves hoarse? Or do we feel slightly embarrassed that we've got a chance of stealing a prize that we shouldn't really have any right to claim? And does this upturn reframe any of the ill feelings most of us have had towards the club's hierarchy for their performance this season? Does this allow us to start to forgive and forget some of our grievances? To restore some confidence in the future?

Or is it all just a flash in the pan? One more false dawn, just to make us feel a type of pain that we'd tried to numb ourselves from experiencing, all over again. They say it’s the hope that kills you. We didn’t have any hope, and in some ways that was quite nice. Now that bloody hope is back, ready to rip us apart.

We often joke there's never a dull moment supporting Bradford City. Except for most of this season, it has been quiet and dull. The narrative predictable, formulaic and stale. At times we’ve been utterly rubbish, with some of the worst performances imaginable. And yet now we might be facing the most unexpected of season finales. A glorious end to an inglorious season.

Whatever lies in store between 3 and 5pm on Saturday, suddenly, you can't take your eyes off this.