Carling Cup match report: Barnsley are lacking heart Mr Hart

Excuses first then though the manner of the defeat means they are almost worthless.

Paul Reid's injury meant we had to partner Bobby Hassell at centre-back with Antony Kay. Fantastic, a lack of pace, height, strength and experience then.

Jacob Burns came in at right back to swiftly prove its yet another position he cant play in.

The rest of the team was those who beat Huddersfield on Saturday and for the first 20 minutes the Reds looked almost capable of pulling off a shock result. The best early chance fell to Nicky Wroe after he was set up by Michael Chopra's clever pass but City keeper and 70's porn star Ronald Watterreus blocked Wroe's point blank effort.

Reds fans were still cursing the City keeper's dodgy mullet a minute later when Joey Barton smashed home their first goal from 20 yards and the team proceeded to collapse in spectacular fashion.

I cannot be bothered to go through them all the goals individually but errors from Colgan, (twice, three times...possibly more) and Burns gifted City a 5-0 half-time lead. Kay, Hassell and the midfield chasing shadows in vain. They looked like scoring from every attack and it possibly should have had six after having a goal disallowed for a foul on Colgan despite nobody anywhere near him. Sympathy from the linesman perhaps.

City then offered the Reds a crumb of comfort at the start of the second half with Barry Conlon finishing neatly after a dodgy back pass from Joey Barton. Big Baz deserved his goal for another hardworking performance where he received little or no assistance from Chris Shuker and Chopra (did he really deserve another month on loan - is he better than Michael Boulding?). Nicky Wroe is another player who can just about hold his head up for sheer work rate if not always ability but hes still young. Stephen McPhail on the other hand certainly has the ability but disappeared totally for large parts of this game - is he really fit?

As for the rest of the second half, the game was slightly more even (City brought on a couple more reserve team players) but two goals from Antoine Sibierski made it seven by the end.

The moronic 'burberry' element among the Barnsley fans once again made their presence felt by trying to start 'chav' wars with the similarly like-minded tossers in the middle tier while ignoring the game to round off a disappointing night all round.

So Chesterfield at home next Saturday followed by Bradford away - vital games where the Reds should be hoping for four points at least. I reckon we need Reid and Matt Carbon back soon if we are to move up the table or Paul Hart may go the way of Chris Turner as calls for the return of Danny Wilson grow.

Lets face it, we didn't really expect to win tonight but if Keegan had not rested Nicolas Anelka tonight the score could have been much worse.....