Rotherham 3-3 Salford City: The Thriller At The Millers’
A six goal ding-dong thriller is enough to grab anyone’s attention, but what if I also told you it was absolutely teeming with narrative? Millers’ gaffer Alex Bruce was sacked, rather harshly, from his position on the Salford coaching staff at the end of last season, and this was his first nibble at revenge. Joe Powell and Ossama Ashley swapped Rotherham for Salford and vice versa this summer, and both absolutely made the most of their first outing against their old club, and an old rivalry was renewed as Macauley Langstaff and Paul Mullin lined up across from each other, each looking to rebuild their careers after suffering from a serious post-League Two golden boot race hangover. Fans of Disney’s Wrexham will be particularly excited about that one. It’s like Captain America and Spiderman having a big tear up, I think. With so much potential for drama, could this game ever really deliver? It’s League Two, of course it could.
The question on everyone’s minds in pre-season wasn’t if Salford would finally achieve promotion to League One this season, but how soon would they have it wrapped up. Imagine their surprise, then, when they crashed out of the Carabao Cup, lost their first three league games on the bounce, and their new big-money striker failed to find the net in any of their opening six games of the season. It’s safe to say it hasn’t quite been the fairytale season the Ammies fans, and Gary Neville, had been dreaming of. The pressure had began to mount on new Salford boss Peter Cklamovski, with a 90th minute victory over strugglers Newport and an undeserved smash-and-grab win at home to a then winless Port Vale side doing little to appease the fans, or convince the wider community that the Australian is the right man for the job. Who would have thought that moving from the Malaysian national team job to a club in League Two would come with an adjustment period? Alex Bruce’s Rotherham had had a similarly director start to the season, but their fixture list has been brutal so far and they can probably consider themselves unlucky not to have gotten more out of a few of their games already. They’re creating more than their fair share of opportunities, they just need to work on not giving away so many to the opposition in the meantime. It’s harder than it sounds, apparently.
It was the visitors that looked the liveliest to open proceedings, coming close early on on a couple of occasions. Some brilliant back-to-front build up play culminated in Millers defender Denzel Hall being called into action to cut out a promising cross, with Joe Powell’s delightful whipped ball in from the resulting corner only just missing his teammates heads and fizzing wide of the post. Early warning signs for Rotherham, and Salford smelled blood.
It wouldn’t be long until they took the lead, finding themselves 1-0 up with just 9 minutes played. The danger again came from a cross into the area, this time it was huge summer signing Luke Molyneux showing off some fancy footwork down the right flank before bending in an inch-perfect ball onto the toes of Ryan Graydon. The centre forward bundled home his first of the season to give Salford a well-earned early lead, and after Salford had one cleared off the line and Rotherham forced a strong save from Will Norris, that lead was eventually doubled come the half-hour mark.
Joe Powell’s time as a Rotherham player came to an end this summer and, like every half decent League Two player that came available this year, he ended up at Salford. In one of the most heartbreaking moments you’ll ever see on a football pitch, Powell scored the goal of his career to put his new side 2-0 up and chose not to celebrate against his former employers. Nonsense. Midfielder Kallum Cesay laid the ball off to Powell about 30 yards from goal, he took a touch to set himself and then launched a rocket into the top corner on his left foot. Pow. I think the phrase you’re looking for is “you don’t save those”. It was his second goal in 6 appearances in Salford colours, equalling his tally of 2 goals in 91 games for Rotherham. Talk about twisting the knife.
As painful as that goal would’ve been to Millers fans, the pain didn’t last. Only four minutes after Joe Powell took the net off to give his side a two goal advantage, the home side had drawn level at 2-2. Salford’s soft underbelly was well and truly exposed by Rotherham without them really having to try. The first goal back came from a simple string of three passes, all to totally unmarked players in and around the Salford box, giving Brandon Cover time to pick his spot and finish coolly beyond Norris for his first goal as a Miller since joining last season. It couldn’t be that easy again, could it? Rotherham came forward again shortly after, passing into wide open space as if Salford were allowing them to practice a passage of play in training. Former Ammie Ossama Ashley was set free in the box, he cut back from the byline to look for a teammate and was completely cleared out by Will Aimson in a clumsy, and frankly lazy, challenge. Penalty. Up stepped Disney Channel star Paul Mullin, who sent the ‘keeper the wrong way and calmly slotted his penalty home to bring the scores level. I’d like to see Miley Cyrus do that.
Of course, it wouldn’t be a proper meltdown if Salford gave away a 2 goal lead and ended up drawing the game, they had to go and let Rotherham take the lead early in the second half to complete the collapse. Abraham Odoh’s braindead off-ball foul earned himself a booking and gifted Rotherham an opportunity from a free kick out on the right hand side. The ball was bent in and cleared, but only as far as Ashley on the edge of the area. With no Salford players anywhere to be seen, and not wanting to be outshone in the screamers-against-your-old-club-off that Joe Powell had started, he let loose a first-time effort from the edge of the area that flew through a sea of bodies and into the net before Norris even had chance to see it. Another belter, but I think I’m going to have to give Joe Powell the prestigious crown of best goal against your former club in the EFL this weekend. At least Ashley celebrated.
Shortly after taking the lead, Rotherham nearly made it 4-2 on the counter attack. Had substitute George Sebine looked up and seen Paul Mullin stood in acres of space instead of shooting from a tight angle, we could be talking about a very different result for the Millers. It still looked like things were going from bad to catastrophic for Salford just 15 minutes later as Odoh received his marching orders for a second yellow card, this time for simulation. It’s a tricky one, there was definitely a hand in the back from Cover, but with nowhere near enough to topple Odoh as dramatically as he went down. Chucking yourself to the floor in desperate search of a penalty while already on a yellow card for a silly challenge is certainly an interesting choice, and one that sums up everything that’s gone wrong for Salford so far.
After Rotheram fumbled yet another chance to make it four, Salford did eventually get their penalty. If we’re talking about silly fouls, this is the pick of the bunch. Salford bent a free kick into the Rotherham area and, despite Will Aimson having no chance of getting the ball, Jili Buyabu decided to take a massive handful of his shirt and drag him to the ground right in front of the referee. Even VAR would’ve seen that. Big-money, and up until this point goalless, Langstaff stepped up and hammered the penalty into the top right corner. Never in doubt. Now his Salford account is finally open, might we start to see the ruthless Macauley Langstaff we know and love from his Notts County days? After just 4 goals in 2 unsuccessful seasons at Millwall, it would be nice to see him get his mojo back. Imagine if Mullin manages to rid his mind of those poor League One spells with Wrexham, Wigan, and Bradford and starts scoring for fun again too? It could be like the 22/23 and 23/24 golden boot shootouts all over again. Langstaff got the better of Mullin on both those occasions, making it 3/3 would really settle the score.
After six goals, two being screamers from players against their former clubs, two penalties, and a red card, both teams decided that was just about enough action for a Saturday afternoon in Rotherham. The rest of the game fizzled out with no late drama and condemned both sides to an unwelcome draw. Rotherham might have taken the result before kick off had they not already dropped 5 points in dominant displays against lesser opposition this season. The league favourites limping into town after a difficult start to the season, gifting you three goals and getting a man sent off is an opportunity you can’t afford to pass up, and Rotherham did. Again. The Millers won’t be in any danger of a relegation scrap, which was being bandied around a real possibility in pre season, but if they don’t sharpen up in both boxes it’ll be a fourth consecutive grey and disappointing campaign for those poor Rotherham fans. As for Salford, I just don’t know what to make of them. They have, on paper, potentially the best squad ever assembled at this level. The gaffer is an unknown quantity, but came in with a solid reputation for playing all-action football that should have seen a team of this quality blitz through the rest of the division. That hasn’t happened, obviously. This weekend’s game at Rotherham was the first time they’ve had less possession than their opponents, usually averaging well over 60% of the ball and managing to do very little of note with it. Maybe the manager just isn’t the wizard from Aus they all thought he was. Any more of this and Cklamovski will be offski. They’ve sacked managers for less. Ask Alex Bruce.