CITY 1 WALSALL 0

PLAY-off semi-final disappointment was followed by a raft of exits during a summer of change.

Perhaps a season effectively over by the start of April should not come as a big surprise.

That is the situation facing a Walsall side who have not made a single appearance in League One’s top ten since. Their year of transition following the promotion near-miss has been unremarkable.

But that could so easily have been City.

Walsall’s non-descript campaign is a good example of how well the Bantams have rebuilt and rebooted from all the upheaval that followed hot on the heels of that Friday night 11 months ago at the Den.

The fact that Stuart McCall’s side have so much still to play for shows what a fine makeover the club have undergone since those potentially turbulent few weeks.

Saturday may have been far removed from the attacking extravaganza that Edin Rahic and Stefan Rupp crave, not to mention their manager, but it delivered the desired result.

One down, two to go in McCall’s calculations for the three wins he has targeted to rubber-stamp that play-off ticket.

The popular phrase “winning ugly” is trotted out traditionally at this juncture of the season. It’s not anywhere near as easy on the eye as “drawing pretty”, which had become City’s trademark, but it’s the established route for getting over the finish line when the nerves start to jangle.

Cast your eyes west for evidence of the effects of “squeaky bum time”; Fleetwood beaten at home by Swindon, Bolton held by doomed Chesterfield before their biggest crowd since the Championship.

Similarly, the visit from a side with nothing to play for other than personal pride did not carry any guarantees. The points had to be ground out and earned.

Walsall, with three centre halves, two holding midfielders and a pair of deep-sitting wing backs, offered a solid blue wall of resistance.

It was one that City floundered on during a grim first half with an atmosphere to match.

The team were flat and plodding; the fans silent and sullen. Valley Parade had all the buzz of a midweek matinee at the Alhambra.

If anything, it was Walsall who carried the bigger threat during that period. Colin Doyle, the subject of surprisingly heavy criticism over that opening punch at Scunthorpe, pulled off a good save to deny Cypriot international Andreas Makris.

City struggled to create anything of note until Neil Etheridge gift-wrapped an opportunity five minutes before the break.

The Walsall keeper, usually one of the division’s soundest stoppers, fluffed Tony McMahon’s cross and coughed it up towards Alex Jones.

His short-range header seemed bound for the net but James O’Connor spared Etheridge’s blushes with a goal-line clearance.

It was a brief flash of excitement amid the general flatness.

McCall could have read the riot act at half-time to shake his troops from their torpor. Instead he chose to remind them how far this team had come.

After eight months of striving and the prize so close, don’t let things drift now by going through the motions.

The difference from the restart was clear – and generated by Mark Marshall.

McCall joked after the game how City had improved when he “brought him on” at half-time.

The City boss said: “I told Marshy that but it was probably a bit harsh. The majority of things that come off for us when the game is tight come through him.”

Of course, the winger had been far from alone in not stepping it up before then.

But his response brought everyone – on and off the pitch – to life. Jinking this way and that and driving at defenders, Marshall injected that impetus that had been lacking in his team.

A colourless contest that had appeared to be drifting nowhere was suddenly focused on the Walsall penalty area.

And yet it probably took a perceived refereeing injustice to really get the City crowd going.

Inconsistent referee Michael Salisbury had the place raging when he saw nothing wrong with Billy Clarke’s header clipping defender Matt Preston on the top of his raised arm.

“You don’t know what you’re doing” screamed the Kop but City, feeling robbed in that instant, now possessed a much clearer vision of their own intentions.

Marshall drove an inviting cross towards Charlie Wyke but Etheridge redeemed himself for that earlier blunder by getting a leg in the way to divert from the bottom corner.

Romain Vincelot, back in a holding midfield role in City’s 4-2-1-3 set-up, glanced wide from the resulting corner.

The momentum was building and swiftly brought its reward.

Again it stemmed from Marshall, this time on the left flank. Drifting in one way then cutting back the other, he scrambled in a low cross which Jones, via an unwitting Scott Laird, nudged back for Clarke to emphatically finish from his late run.

Clarke’s extravagant knee-slide celebration unleashed not only the emotion of ending a five-month wait for his seventh goal of the campaign but also the overall feeling of relief at unlocking the door on another crunch win.

Wyke could then have set the seal on proceedings with a second.

The centre forward had been well shackled by O’Connor throughout the afternoon but showed good strength to shake off his marker in pursuit of James Meredith’s ball over the top only to drive his first-timer across goal.

Walsall’s threat had been minimal with Doyle well protected by Rory McArdle and the returning Nathaniel Knight-Percival, who was sporting a Dire Straits-style headband to protect that gouge in his forehead.

But the City stopper was called upon to make another important block from Kieron Morris before the points were in the bag.

The Bantams had responded from the short, sharp shock of losing at Scunthorpe – another hurdle cleared.

“There are things we can work on certainly,” admitted McCall. “But Walsall were well organised and made it tough.

“That’s when we need the supporters and everybody to show a bit of patience and have a bit of understanding, which they did.

“We’ve turned those draws at home into wins recently and that’s been key. Two 1-0 wins and a 2-1 in the last minute could have easily all ended up as draws but they’ve not.”