Cardiff Drop Johnson? No Chance!

A fellow Cardiff City supporter (who shall remain nameless) this week spent a fruitless 30 minutes attempting to persuade me that Cardiff City should drop centre-back Roger Johnson in favour of Darren Purse.


I have no problems with Purse, he's a solid Championship defender but Jones was right to drop him and partner Johnson with Loovens in central defnece - the recent run only backs that up.



However I do have problems with the criticism aimed at Roger Johnson with words as strong as 'liability' being used. This, to me, is ludicrous. The argument predictably centred around Johnson's unfortunate knack of scoring own goals in recent games.


RJ has scored own goals against West Brom and Stoke City in the last few games but he could hardly be blamed for either of them, on both occasions he was in the right position and on both occasion he was decived by a team-mate missing their chance to clear. Against West Brom Loovens missed a header, and Johnson's deflection looped over Oakes to gift a last minute point to WBA while against Stoke, Paul Parry inexplicably missed his kick and the ball re-bounded in off the defender's leg.


Both extremely unfortunate and neither attributable to a lack of concentration or skill by Johnson. He's no Andy Jordan - who can forget that piledriver against Exeter City ?



No, for me, Johnson is the rock of the side and an excellent defender. He is strong in the air and dominates strikers, as well as being very stong on the ground. He chips in with goals at the right end and has 5 already this season. I guess it's just football, but for now at least - don't blame Roger !