Brilliant Bradford capitalise on defensive errors and a dreadful afternoon for Mansfield Town

Mansfield’s individual errors led to easy Bradford goals on Saturday as the amber and blues never got going.

Marek Stech’s calamity from a Bradford corner saw the Stags keeper fumble the ball into the back of his own net in the eighth minute of the game.

Connor Wood doubled Bradford’s lead after a fantastic move from the Bantams. Harry Pritchard’s flick found Wood as he slotted past Stech in the 14th minute.

Bradford continued the onslaught in the second-half after another bit of fantastic build-up play. Novak held up the ball near the corner flag and his backheel pass found Wood and his near post cross was turned into the back off the net by Clayton Donaldson.

Mansfield’s afternoon went from bad to worse as Stags debutant George Lapslie got himself sent off after a second yellow and reduced the amber and blues to ten men with 15 minutes to go.

Second-half substitute Andy Cook was able to get a consolation goal for the Stags after he headed the ball home from a Corey O’Keeffe corner.

Defensively the Stags have looked so lost and have not been anywhere near their best as they’ve conceded nine goals in six matches this season in League Two.

The 3-5-2 formation doesn’t seem to be working for Graham Coughlan’s men as it has seen Bradford’s strikers get in behind the backline that consisted of Ryan Sweeney, Ferrand Rawson and Rollin Meneyese.

Meneyese has been defensively poor this season so far. His heading and scuffed clearances against Bradford on Saturday was a thorn in his team’s side.

He also managed only 11 accurate passes out of the 30 he attempted in the whole game giving him a pass accuracy of 37%.

Sweeney also had a below-par game as another of the defenders that had a pass success rate of below 50%. The Mansfield captain attempted three more passes than Meneyese but had completed four more than his defensive teammate giving him a 46% pass completion rate.

Rawson only played 45 minutes due to being substitute off for Mal Benning as he managed to get in 15 passes in the first 45 minutes. Nine of those passes were completed giving him a 60% success rate which is the best out of the back three.

All of them didn’t look quite comfortable with the ball at their feet. It is only early doors for the trio as the manager brought in Rawson and Meneyese to support Sweeney in a back three so it will take time for them to gel but, they shouldn’t be able to switch off so easily.

They weren’t supporting each other enough as shown when Donaldson scored his goal to put Bradford 3-0 up. The defence fell to sleep as Novak found Wood with a backheel and none of the defenders rushed over to stop the cross from going in.

The trio lost 13 duels in total between them and let in three goals. They got a clean sheet last weekend which should have installed some self-belief that they are able to shut out games and not to concede late on.

On top of that, Stech made a dreadful error that led to Bradford grabbing their first. What looked like an easy save from the Stags keeper saw him drop the ball and it bounced off of his own knee and ended up in the back of his own net.

The only positive taken from the game was that George Lapslie looked like a really good player. As the midfielder said he is a box to box midfielder that has a never die attitude installed in him. That was shown on display as the Charlton loanee ran from box to box spraying the passes and trying to get a move going.

Lapslie was sent off in the 78th minute after a second bookable offence that saw him go from debut hero to debut zero.

O’Keeffe continued showing his class at right wing-back and tried to install some offensive movement from his teammates.

He did get an assist for the only Stags goal and completed a hefty amount of passes for Mansfield Town. He managed to recover the ball in much-needed areas and posed a threat going down the right when on the attack.

Mansfield remain without a in six league games having now lost three and drawn three which sees them drop into 23rd position and into the relegation zone.

On the other hand, Bradford after their comfortable victory against the Stags move up into 13th place. Their win against Mansfield their first away win for over a year with the last coming against Morecambe on the 12th October 2019 as they beat the Shrimps 2-1 that day.

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