The tabloids would have you believe it’s Cardiff City’s most important game since they won the FA Cup back in 1927. But most Bluebirds fans would rate Sunday’s semi-final against Barnsley no more significant than the Welsh club’s historic European Cup Winners’ Cup semi against SV Hamburg exactly 40 years ago.

The second leg of that tie was the game that turned me into an arch-pessimist - and which makes me fear we are going to lose on Sunday in a penalty shootout.

OK, Cardiff’s success in this season’s competition has astounded me - after half a century of hurt, I would not have dreamt we’d get so close to winning a major tournament in my lifetime. And to do it in an era where English football is totally dominated by the so-called Big Four is even more staggering - even if we haven’t  personally disposed of any of them.

'We are on a hiding to nothing should the match go to a penalty shootout. Fowler apart, we haven’t a single proven penalty-taker, apart from club captain Darren Purse, who is unlikely to make the starting line-up'


Our opponents Barnsley have, of course, dumped out both Liverpool and Chelsea and on that score alone are probably the people’s favourites for to win the FA Cup  - yet the bookies’ outsiders of the four remaining teams.

The fact the relegation-haunted Tykes’ league results have been hopeless since the quarter-final and we haven’t lost a match suggests that on form alone it should be a doddle for Dave Jones’s men to make the final.

Back in 1968 everyone was saying victory over Hamburg  was a formality after we drew 1-1 in Germany in the first leg. Instead, we lost 3-2 at Ninian Park in a game decided by the very last kick, when a speculative shot bobbled past Cardiff keeper Bob Wilson (no, not the Arsenal and BBC Bob!) to put Uwe Seeler’s team into the final.

I was sitting behind the goal and, in football terms, it remains the lowest point of my life. I’m sure it’s right down there with Wilson, too - and seconds later the poor guy had to put up with stupid kids invading the pitch and surrounding him for his autograph.

Three years later, months after we sold our talisman John Toshack to Liverpool for a record £111,000, we just missed out on promotion to the old First Division after losing a promotion showdown to Sheffield United 5-1. And apart from a couple of promotions from the lower divisions plus the 2003 play-off victory over QPR that lifted us into what is now the Championship,  that’s all I’ve had to shout about in nearly half a century.

So victory over Barnsley on Sunday will be something really special not only for Jones’s shock troops, but for thousands of lifelong supporters like me as well. There are still tens of thousands of fans in the valleys cheering Cardiff on in spirit every week - even if only a small percentage of them go to matches these days. And they’ll be hoping for a double dose of local glory  on Sunday as Cardiff Blues - with whom the Bluebirds will be ground-sharing when their embryo new stadium is completed - take on Toulouse in the quarter-final of the Heineken Cup

My big concern about Jones’s squad is that with Robbie Fowler on long-term injury leave, we are patently thin in the striking department. But that should be compensated for by a superb midfield in which 17-year-old Aaron Ramsey is rapidly developing into THE find of 2008 - and by a rock-solid defence in which centre-back Roger Johnson, my player of the season, has proved as lethal in the opposition area as he is in blocking out attackers.

My other worry is that we are on a hiding to nothing should the match go to a penalty shootout. Fowler apart, we haven’t a single proven penalty-taker, apart from club captain Darren Purse, who is unlikely to make the starting line-up.

There is of course another  incentive for the Bluebirds - and that is to wipe the smile off Barnsley boss Simon Davey, a Swansea boy who openly admits he likes to see Cardiff lose.

I for one have never been able to understand the hatred between Cardiff and Swansea fans. I’ve always loved to see the Swans doing well - just as long as they don’t do better than the Bluebirds. And the likelihood of two Championship derby clashes with them next season is a mouthwatering prospect.

Cardiff folk are happy enough to cheer on the Neath-Swansea Ospreys when they masquerade as the Wales rugby team. And nobody questions whether a Glamorgan cricketer is from Cardiff or Swansea when the Welsh county are winning matches.

Every Welshman says he is proud to be Welsh. And that should mean supporting ALL teams from the Principality - not spewing vitriol on those elements which aren’t in your own backyard.

That’s why I found it hard to listen to Davey, a so-called proud Welshman, telling BBC TV viewers in the build-up to the Middlesbrough-Cardiff quarter-final that he wanted Boro to win.

Fortunately, Merseysider Jones sees things very much as I do - and believes success for Swansea can only help to boost the standing of Welsh sport in general. He watched the Swansea v Bournemouth game today (Saturday) before heading for Wembley and says: "I work and I live in Wales and the main thing for me is that all the Welsh teams do well.

"The Welsh are very proud people and want to do well - and it will be good for all of Wales if Swansea get promoted to the Championship because their players are going to be competing at a higher level."

Did you here that, Mr Davey? I’m just hoping you’re left to sit in Portsmouth or West Brom’s corner as they take on the Bluebirds in the big Wembley showdown on May.