Walsall are not getting ahead of themselves but at the Bescot on Saturday they got ahead of Burton Albion by beating them 2-0 to displace them at the top of League One on goal difference, and their manager, Dean Smith, was entitled to say, “Losing one in 12 proves you are up there for a reason.”
They have conceded only six goals in those 12 games and lost once, at home to Bury, lying fourth. They should have conceded a seventh here in the 88th minute but Timmy Thiele scuffed his close-range shot with only Craig MacGillivray in goal to beat. The score was 1-0 at the time and the Brewers were coming on strong. Tom Bradshaw’s emphatic penalty for flimsy hands in added time spared a few fingernails.
Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink, Burton’s manager, was more disposed to blame a poor first half, in which Liam Kinsella put Walsall ahead in the 36th minute. “We weren’t on the front foot and didn’t win our second balls,” he said. “We came out of our shape to chase the ball and they like that; they pick you off in pockets. In the second half we addressed that and there was only one team likely to score. We had a really good chance but it was not to be.” He would surely have buried it himself.
Hasselbaink has been at Burton for 11 months, a left-field choice by a right-minded club that, as with Nigel Clough who took them to the threshold of the League in 2009, backs its appointments to the hilt. Gary Rowett, also a first-timer, left them third in League Two for Birmingham. Hasselbaink had them top by February and kept them there for the last 15 games. Their place at the highest level of their life is down to a defence built around John Mousinho and all-round organisation until Walsall upset it.
For all their new Pirelli stadium, where they moved in 2005, and recent elevation Burton have a history too, with famous names littering their past on the way up or down in their careers – Eddie Shimwell, right-back for Blackpool in Stanley Matthews’ 1953 Cup Final, Kevin Hector, Andy Sinton, the long-throwers Ian Hutchinson (Chelsea) and Rory Delap, and Ian Storey-Moore. On Saturday their substitutes included enough hyphens to stretch off the bench but the future stars looked to be playing for Walsall.
Their system is to all intents 2-1-5-1-1, though Smith said of the defensive one and man of the match, Adam Chambers: “He deserved that. He sat in front of our three centre-halves, won tackles, won headers and distributed it very well.” His anticipation and speed at 34 also stood out but who was the third man in central defence, besides James O’Connor and Paul Downing, withdrawing deep to provide a safe get-out for anyone under pressure? The full-backs did defensive duties but were constantly adding width to the attacking options.
The midfield was largely grown in the academy and Kinsella, 19 and son of Mark, once of Ireland and Walsall himself, was playing only because the normal right-back, Jason Demetriou, was doing his bit for Wales with Cyprus’s winning goal. Kinsella’s goal was an angled arrow and it was fitting that the delivery service was by way of Rico Henry, 18, and Romaine Sawyers, 23. Smith has an affiliation to the club, starting as a teenage player, and they are prospering in loyalty. He is in his fifth full season (unlike the gadfly José Mourinho, who has yet to get far into a fourth) and he and Hasselbaink turned down Rotherham’s approaches last week.
With the international break this was the top English league match, first to enjoy the 90 days of fresh air issuing from Zurich and a fine example of all that is best in the game. Pleasingly for this visit of the Brewers the fourth official was A Tankard. Smith talked beforehand of “the improbable dream” of promotion. The fortunes of those who went up last May show how tough that step is when made, in the company of others descending with financial parachutes. MK Dons, Bristol City and Preston are all at the south end of the Championship. But it is good to dream.
