The last time Cardiff was in the Premier League, the team was playing controversially in red jerseys, had one of its most high-profile managers ever in Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, and was in the throes of a wild and lavish era of spending.
Four years later, the Welsh club is on the cusp of a return to the world’s most lucrative league and it appears sanity and order has been restored.
When Cardiff’s players take on Reading on Sunday needing a victory to seal automatic promotion, they’ll be wearing the 119-year-old club’s traditional color of blue. They’ll be roared on by one of the more down-to-earth and wily managers in the British game. And a hard-working and modestly assembled squad will be in it together.
“Sunday will be a massive day for everybody involved with the club,” Cardiff manager Neil Warnock said. “It’s a happy club now.”
The irrepressible Warnock is largely responsible for that.
He was 68 - at the time the oldest coach working in Britain - when he was hired in October 2016 to take charge of the 15th club of his 36-year managerial career. He didn’t need the job - his plan was to retire a decade earlier - but the love of the game, especially in English football’s grueling lower leagues, brought him back.
Cardiff was in something of a mess. Next-to-last in the second-tier League Championship, the club was on its third manager in six months and Malaysian owner Vincent Tan was reining in the rash spending of a few years back, having already climbed down from his controversial rebranding of Cardiff - including the color change from blue to red that sparked fury among many fans. Certainly Warnock wouldn’t have the freedom that Solskjaer had in the transfer market - in his eight months at Cardiff in and out of the Premier League, the Champions League-winning former Manchester United striker brought in 19 players, most of them flops.
Opinionated, chirpy and with an infectious character, Warnock proved to be a perfect fit for Cardiff. He guided the team to a mid-table finish at the end of his first season and has been the driving force behind an improbable promotion campaign this season despite spending a fraction of the outlay of rival clubs like Aston Villa, Derby and Middlesbrough.
With Wolverhampton Wanderers cruising to the second-tier title, second place has boiled down to a fight between Cardiff and Fulham, who were both relegated from the top flight in 2014 with only two points separating them.
Cardiff, the gritty battlers playing and fighting in the image of their manager. Fulham, the easy-on-the-eye team from an affluent area of west London.
With one game left, Cardiff is in second place and a point ahead of Fulham, whose last game is at Birmingham - like Reading, a team fighting relegation. To the winner, a place in the Premier League and a guaranteed windfall of at least $230 million, potentially so much more. To the loser, a place in the playoffs and the potential for heartbreak.
For Warnock, who is now 69, it would be a record eighth promotion in English football and a fourth time as manager in the Premier League, after stints in it with Sheffield United, Queens Park Rangers and Crystal Palace.
He would add a dash of charisma and color to the Premier League. Passion, too. One of the more memorable sights in recent weeks was Warnock repeatedly swearing at Wolves manager Nuno Espirito Santo and walking away from him in disgust after a match last month. Espirito Santo has run onto the field in celebration after Cardiff missed two late penalties and Warnock described the Portuguese coach as a “disgrace.”
His conversion of Callum Paterson from a right back to an attacking midfielder highlighted Warnock’s intuition. In typical Warnock fashion, he made light of it, saying: “When I signed him, I knew he would score six or seven goals as a full back, but what I didn’t know is that he can’t defend.”
Fulham has gone 23 games unbeaten in the league, stretching back to December when it was 18 points behind Cardiff. Ninety minutes on Sunday will determine if the Londoners can snatch second place.
With Warnock at the helm, Cardiff will not give it up without a fight.
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Steve Douglas is at www.twitter.com/sdouglas80
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