Barnsley vs Bristol City. Sky Bet Championship.
Oakwell StadiumAttendance12,236.
Friday 30 March 2018 18:24, UK
Bristol City scored a late equaliser against Barnsley as the sides fought out a 2-2 draw.
Kieffer Moore broke the deadlock early on from a corner, before Famara Diedhiou got one back for the visitors.
Brad Potts then grabbed what looked to be a winner for Barnsley but Josh Brownhill scored in added time and equalise on his return to Oakwell.
A point suits neither side, with Bristol City falling off the pace and out of the play-off places in recent weeks. It may be more valuable for the Tykes, as it moves them one clear of the relegation zone but they remain winless at home in 2018.
Barnsley started the game brightly, with City defender and last man back Nathan Baker fortunate to only receive a yellow card when he brought down Moore just outside the area.
From the resulting corner, the Tykes got their reward. George Moncur, one of four changes to the starting line-up, delivered the dead ball towards the front post and Moore beat all competition to head in the opening goal in the seventh minute.
City soon found their way through and it was only some great defensive work from Adam Jackson and Andy Yiadom which prevented Bobby Reid from having two opportunities to test Barnsley goalkeeper Adam Davies.
Davies was left helpless moments later though as City struck back on the half-hour mark. Marlon Pack sent a diagonal pass to Diedhiou on the edge of the Barnsley box and the Senegalese frontman curled the ball beautifully into the top right corner.
With the scores level, in-form loanee Oliver McBurnie should have sent his side ahead just before the break after Moore headed down Yiadom's long ball into the box, but the Scottish striker could only direct his header straight at Frank Fielding.
Fielding saved his team shortly after the break, somehow managing to get across his net and stop Potts poking home at the back post from Moncur's teasing delivery.
Moore had two more bites of the cherry but was denied by Fielding twice. The striker got in behind the defence from Gary Gardner's inch-perfect ball but Fielding did well to keep him out, then got down to prevent the 25-year-old from heading in from the resulting corner.
Moore was then involved again as Barnsley took the lead. The Tykes striker ran on to substitute Joe Williams' lofted ball and Moore waited perfectly before rolling a cross into the box and it was Potts who sprinted in front of his man to prod home with just twelve minutes remaining.
Former Barnsley loanee Brownhill then delivered his old team a huge blow, sending a looping header over Davies from Joe Bryan's cross to level the game in injury time.
Jose Morais: "I have the feeling that we deserved much more than we got and I need to be grateful and happy for what we got. It was what was possible in the game and we can't go against this.
"I feel happy because the team created, played and deserved, really, the three points and showed the quality that is expected to exist in a league like the Championship. I believe we have the quality to stay in this league and we showed this quality."
Lee Johnson: "I was disappointed in our start. I thought Barnsley played better than us, they were quicker to the ball and thought Kieffer Moore caused us some right problems, to be honest. I thought we looked a bit ropey at the back, which is unlike us, as we're normally very, very solid, so credit to Barnsley.
"Obviously it was a great goal to get back into it from Famara. We needed that individual brilliance from him because we've been working on that a fair bit in training - that exact move. It became end-to-end and it could've gone either way. We had a couple good chances, but then they had some very good chances as well. Before the game, I'd have been disappointed with a draw, but after the game I'm quite pleased with a resilient point."
