A point is no prize for City

Cardiff City 0 Bristol City 0: IT IS a measure of their own high expectations that City's players were dissatisfied with an honourable draw on Welsh soil, writes Andy Stockhausen.

Few teams will escape Ninian Park with a point this season, much less a clean sheet.

Yet City's resident Welshman, Gavin Williams, spoke for his team-mates when he insisted: "We should have taken all three points. We're disappointed not to have won, especially as we were the better team in the second half.

"Perhaps a draw was a fair result in the end, but we don't see it that way. I think that shows just how ambitious we are and how high we've set our sights this season."

Cardiff dominated the first half without quite managing to find a way through a resolute City defence, but the visitors flexed their muscles after the break and, with a little luck and better judgement, could easily have emerged victorious.

"The gaffer had a right go at us at half-time," revealed Williams, who replaced the injured Brian Wilson after 25 minutes. "He told us where we were going wrong and we went back out there and put it right.

"We made some good chances and, on another day, we'd expect to take some of those and win the game. That's why we're a bit disappointed."

Even so, there was much to admire about City's performance. Faced by a fiercely partisan crowd and a Bluebirds team in buoyant mood following a six-match unbeaten start to the campaign, the Robins stood firm and demonstrated the resilience which became their hallmark last season.

If the critics expect Gary Johnson's team to succumb to second season syndrome in the Championship, they are still waiting. Unbeaten in five games, last term's beaten play-off finalists have established themselves among the early front-runners and are showing no signs of faltering.

Ninian Park was no place for feint hearts and Williams acknowledged: "This is hard place to come and get a result. To be honest, it's not very nice.

"It's a hostile atmosphere, the crowd are on your back from the start and a lot of teams will go under here this season."

Some admission from a Welshman whose boyhood heroes all wore the blue of Cardiff.

At a time when the Premier League is fast becoming a fantastical circus, the Championship offers a welcome return to basics.

In a division where any team is capable of beating any other and where selecting promotion and relegation favourites is a hazardous business, being difficult to beat is a priceless commodity.

Forced to resort to last-ditch defence for long periods in the first half, City sought recourse in tenacity and workrate, virtues which might be sniffed at in the Premier League, but which represent a prerequisite for success in English football's second tier.

Cardiff did their bit, Joe Ledley, Paul Parry and Jay Bothroyd all threatening to break the deadlock during a thunderous first half.

But City defended magnificently, throwing themselves into tackles and putting their bodies on the line to keep the blue-shirted hordes at bay. And when the defence was finally breached, extrovert Brazilian goalkeeper Adriano Basso came to the rescue, rushing from his line to deny Bothroyd and then going down low to his left to push away Peter Whittingham's goal-bound volley.

The words of their irate manager still ringing in their ears, City improved markedly after the break. Livewire striker Nicky Maynard had already skimmed the crossbar with a first-half shot delivered from range when he shrugged off the attentions of Bluebirds defender Miguel Comminges and unleashed an angled drive which required on-loan keeper Tom Heaton to execute a startling fingertip save.

Desperate to score against the club he supported as a boy, the industrious Williams twice sent shots narrowly off target and was then denied a clear goal-scoring chance by Darren Purse's last-gasp intervention.

Bradley Orr directed a header inches wide, the indomitable Cole Skuse sent a similar effort over the bar and Maynard tested Heaton at his near post as City poured forward in search of a dramatic winner.

But it was Cardiff who came closest to breaking the deadlock, Whittingham connecting with a sweetly-struck volley from the edge of the penalty area. But justice was served when Basso took off to save two-handed at full stretch.