Rubin Colwill Rescues Cardiff City in Dramatic Derby
Rubin Colwill turned a bruising Welsh derby on its head – and left his manager half-delighted, half-guilty about even putting him on the pitch.
Cardiff City were staring at opening-night defeat in the Championship, Kieffer Moore’s early strike for Wrexham hanging over the Cardiff City Stadium like a storm cloud. The visitors had chances to kill it. They didn’t. The door stayed ajar.
And in the eighth minute of stoppage time, Colwill smashed it off its hinges.
The Wales international, barely fit and short of training, stepped up over a late free-kick and lashed it in to rescue a 1-1 draw that felt, for Cardiff, a lot like a win.
A gamble Barry-Murphy knew he shouldn’t take
Brian Barry-Murphy didn’t try to dress it up. He knew Colwill was not ready for a big shift.
Colwill had started the night on the bench, still working his way back from an ankle problem that had disrupted his pre-season. Two training sessions under his belt. That was it.
Yet as the hour mark passed and Cardiff toiled, Barry-Murphy rolled the dice, sending on the attacking midfielder as part of a raft of changes to shift the rhythm of the game.
"I thought he had a big impact on a big game," the Cardiff head coach said, acknowledging the risk. "He's only trained for two days really, so I probably shouldn't have put him on as early as I did."
The game state left him with little choice. Cardiff were huffing and puffing, short of incision, while Wrexham’s missed chances kept the contest alive.
"The way the game was going, I felt as if we needed a bit of something different and he can do that from deep," Barry-Murphy explained. "So we just take it day by day with him and see how he is."
A late strike, a caution, and a warning
Colwill provided exactly that “something different”. His late free-kick, drilled with conviction, dragged Cardiff level and detonated celebrations around the stadium.
The equaliser did more than salvage a point. It gave Barry-Murphy’s side a jolt of belief to start their Championship campaign, a draw that carried the emotional weight of a last-gasp victory.
Colwill, the manager stressed, is central to what Cardiff want to be.
"He's an impeccable professional, loves the game, loves the club, so he's a huge figure for us here, I can't deny that," Barry-Murphy said. "He just needs to find some rhythm and volume in his training because he hasn't done a lot, so we can't rush him back because that would just put him at risk for no reason."
The emotion of the moment briefly got the better of the head coach. As the bench and players erupted, Barry-Murphy strayed from his technical area and the referee showed him a yellow card amid the chaos.
Asked if the booking was worth it after such a dramatic leveller, he grinned before pushing back: "No, no, no. I don't want to be paying any fines. I was a bit embarrassed."
Embarrassed or not, his late gamble kept Cardiff’s season from starting with a flat note. Now the question is whether Colwill’s right boot has just lit the spark for something far bigger.
