The Voice - Match preview #42: Bradford City vs Stevenage Saturday 11th April 2026 3:00pm

They've now got 2 more points that us away from home and won 1 more game than us and sit 7th in the away table so they've been doing something right over the course of the season. Like us the form since the start of the year hasn't been great but in the last few games they've turned it around, stopped conceding and got 7 points from their last 4 and every chance they get something at Bolton on Tuesday.

 

It's nowhere near that high unfortunately. There was a recent study and in the PL it was between 52 and 55 minutes. Around 50 minutes in the champ and league one being slightly higher at an average of 55 minutes.

 

Won 4 drawn 1 lost 1 in last six matches and they are only 4 points behind us with a game in hand and we are having a great season. As I say they are a very difficult team to play against

 

Why not? They're massively limited and we're a better side.

1 shot on target isn't going to win many games, they just had a bit of lady luck today but I'd be more than confident of turning them over in a 2 leg tie.

 

Away form ???‽?

They are indeed difficult to play against but magically the teams they play away from home have no issues of playing them ..........still make out they are indeed another amazing team and we shouldnt be to hard because despite 1 win out of the last 10 away games before today they are rather good really.

 

Bolton will put them away

 

We may have been but their keeper pulled off three blinding saves which on a different day would be in the onion bag . It wouldn’t bother me playing them again with a full side .

 

I think he could see it though Dave that's the frustrating thing. He just chose to ignore it and do nothing about it. He spoke to the goalie at one point and then a couple of minutes later spoke to Piergianni, the captain, and pointed towards the goalie!! Then he waved him to play the ball 3 or 4 times at goal kicks. Then after the goalie had made a save and the ball went for a goal kick the goalie was celebrating with his team mates. The ref pointed at the goalkeeper and then at the ball to hurry him up and out of his celebrations!! All that and yet he never got a booking.....

I won't even mention the throw ins.....

It was bizarre towards the end as well when they made 2 substitutions. As one lad sauntered off, the ref must have been told who the second sub was and went to the lad. He literally stood next to him for 20 seconds and did nothing, whilst the first lad meandered off and never once started to usher him off and then walked slowly across the pitch with him....the lad could have been almost off the pitch if the ref had started him walking....plus, both should have exited the pitch by the nearest touchline which was Midland Rd NOT the main stand.

Like you say, WEAK.

 

Stevenage and its catchment totals 600,000 people . I’ve worked there . The local station has a footfall of 5-6 million a year last time I looked .
Stevenage have Luton , Cambridge and Watford a shortish drive away . They are poorly watched because it’s a quick train into London so has London clubs, namely Arsenal to contend with, as opposed to all the clubs in West Yorkshire.

 

I cant believe any City fan thought the ref was OK today.

It was because of his weakness that we weren't able to play our normal game.

Even their keeper admits their job today was to really slow the game down and stop us playing at every opportunity.



A good ref would have stamped that out in the first 20 mins. Booking their keeper for time wasting in the first half would have been a great start to stopping their dark arts approach to the game.

City did try to impose themselves but due to incompetent officials just were not able to.

3rd in the table and people are having a go at GA. Give your heads a wobble.

 

You see nothing wrong with the way they play but wouldn’t want to watch it yourself . Eh???
Their play whilst effective more often than not , is bloody awful to watch . I’d have said the same win , lose or draw .

 

They both play the same way ! The %age game

 

I don't think Jackson can do many minutes at the moment. If you saw him in the warm up his leg was very heavily strapped, covered up by socks in the full kit. I get the feeling he can only do about 25 minutes at the moment.

 

That’s fair but from two minutes from the start

 

Gain Jackson , lose Tyrike and Bobby?

 

Ditto.

 

I'm block E and it looked an ugly second go at Tilt to me when he was on the floor.

 

]

Yea I’m not going to slag off Stevenage for playing the way they do. As a fan I wouldn’t be happy but I’m not so I don’t care. It’s down to our players to put in a better performance and beat them.
We haven’t been much fun to watch have we let’s be honest?

 

If we'd made an attempt to score their apparent timewasting would have been stopped mate. I'm more concerned that once again we didn't really start playing until about 15/20 minutes left. I can't really fault what Stevenage did, coming to Valley Parade with our outstanding home record and doing a number on us. Atmosphere wise it was like a morgue for most of the game.