The Bluebirds boss spoke after the 4-3 win over Doncaster Rovers at Cardiff City Stadium
18:16, 13 Dec 2025Updated 09:51, 14 Dec 2025
Cardiff City head coach Brian Barry-Murphy(Image: Huw Evans Picture Agency Ltd)
Brian Barry-Murphy heaped praise on Cian Ashford and said at times he “carried” Cardiff City’s attack and “stepped up” when his team needed him most in the 4-3 triumph over Doncaster Rovers.
Ashford was sensational for City, and was named WalesOnline’s star man in the player ratings, after turning out arguably his best display of the campaign.
His goal was a belter, with the winger having picked up the ball 30 yards from goal before driving through two defenders and poking past the Donny ‘keeper. And he showed endeavour in the 99th minute, too, to set up Joel Bagan’s winner.
With legs tiring and minds fading, the 20-year-old academy grad chopped in from the right and rifled a low shot on goal, which was parried into the left-back’s path.
Cardiff’s four goals mean they extend their position as the league’s top scorers, with 36. Speaking about the attack, and Ashford in general, Barry-Murphy said: “I think we look really dangerous. I think we can score goals by how the team plays. We’re not relying on any one individual.
“Obviously Yousef (Salech) receives a lot of headlines, and Callum (Robinson) when he plays, but Joel Bagan scored and Cian Ashford has really stepped up to the plate.
“I thought Cian carried us at times today when we were in need of real quality and when the game wasn’t perfect, he was the one who had real quality.”
Clearly, conceding three goals at home is less than ideal. And at times, Doncaster looked like they had opportunities to win it.
Nathan Trott pulled out a couple of important saves, while Donny will rue a couple of one-v-one opportunities they squandered, too.
So while, for the neutral or City supporters, a win of that nature is thrilling, for the Bluebirds manager, he is under no illusion about how much his side need to improve, despite the win maintain their four-point lead at the top of League One.
“Our intention was to play a lot better and have more control in the game, but it didn’t work out that way,” Barry-Murphy added.
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“The most pleasing thing is that we found a way to win and create enough chances to do that. I’m very pleased for the players and the supporters that we managed to win through.
“It gives you such an opportunity to improve the team, and it’s clearly evident to us how much room for improvement we have, and it’s probably the most exciting thing.
“If I speak too much about what we perceive as failings in the game, it would discredit Doncaster and they played a very good game and are so dangerous in the way that they play. And we knew that beforehand, but our performance numbers just weren’t at the level that we would want.
“But there’s a whole lot of reasons for that, and the most important thing is that we found a way to win, and we did.
“Throughout the course of the season, you’re going to have games where you defend flawlessly like we did (at Stevenage) on Tuesday and look really solid defensively, and games like today where it’s just different.
“Every test in this league is different. And we just spent the second half where we looked as if we lost our composure and we were very frantic in the way we played the game.
“And at the end, Cian Ashford showed the type of composure that we want and had the real quality action.
“And then Joel Bagan showed the aggressive intent that we wanted to be in that position to score a goal so late and send the stadium wild.”
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