Omari Kellyman: Cardiff City want to 'finish season in style' against Mansfield Town
Championship-bound Cardiff City will see out their League One season at the One Call Stadium this Saturday.
The Bluebirds are looking to end their season with a flourish before all focus shifts to their pending step up to England’s second division. The Welsh side have comfortably secured their promotion with 91 points on the board, 16 clear of their closest rivals beneath them in Bolton.
Mansfield Town are also eager to finish this campaign on a high, having already bettered last year’s points tally by some margin.
Stags secured their safety in League One with plenty of time to spare and are now up to 62 points heading into their final fixture. They still have the opportunity to finish as high as ninth this season, which would mark their best league result in 47 years.
Nigel Clough’s side will need a win against Cardiff and they’ll also be relying on Reading and Huddersfield Town to drop points if they want to achieve such a feat.
Cardiff City boss Brian Barry-Murphy has already stressed ‘there will be no messing around’ from his side when they kick off at the One Call. The Irish coach wants to deliver a performance to celebrate away from home and knows it’ll be a ‘tough challenge’ to take points from Stags in their back garden.
Bluebirds midfielder Omari Kellyman is also eager to get stuck into the action in NG18. The 20-year-old – who is on loan with Cardiff from Chelsea – has nine League One goals so far this season.
“We’re buzzing for it. We’ve done it throughout the course of the season, but I think it will be nice to go and put the icing on the cake and finish the season in style,” Kellyman told Cardiff City media.
“All the work we’ve put in through the season has amounted to this, and now we can just enjoy ourselves. You can see that we haven’t taken our feet off the pedal, we’re all still raring to go and get results. We’ve hit the club record for the highest points in a season and we’re looking to knock it again.”
Like his head coach, Kellyman is aware of the threat Stags pose. Mansfield Town have lost just once in their last 14 games and have the joint third-best defensive record in the league at this point.
“We know what they’re capable of. I feel like any team in this league is capable of beating anyone. Upsets happen, so we know what to expect from a physical team, and we’ve got to bring it to them.”