Championship Round-Up: Swansea Back on Top, and Millwall Lead 2-0 Twice for Two Points

Michael Skubala left Lincoln City in May, four weeks after taking them to the League One title, and on Tuesday night nine of the players who had won it for him lined up at Ashton Gate wearing the other shirt. They beat him. Bristol City had 67.5% of the ball, eighteen shots to nine and thirteen corners to four, and lost, which is the kind of evening that makes a manager study the carpet on the way to the tunnel.

The goal came eight minutes after the break and it was a gift. Rob Dickie played a sloppy backpass towards Sam Tickle, who had come off his line, Ben House got a boot on it and squared, and Freddie Draper had an empty net to push into for his second goal in two games. Before that, Bristol City had done everything but score: Lorent Tolaj headed against the bar, George Wickens tapped a Hirakawa effort over, Gibson Yah headed wide from a few yards. The evening got worse for Dickie, who was stretchered off later in the second half with what looked like a serious knee injury.

It was the first league meeting between the clubs since April 1986. Lincoln took a third successive away league win and a fourth clean sheet in five, and the Imps have now won three times this season, every one of them on somebody else's ground.

Millwall had 19.8% of the ball at the Riverside and led 2-0 at half-time, which tells you most of what their evening was about. Camiel Neghli launched a ball forward on eleven minutes, Tairyk Arconte held off Luke Ayling and beat Radek Vitek low at his near post. Twenty-five minutes later Lyndon Dykes scrambled in from a corner, his fourth goal in four games, on the day he had been left out of Sebastian Pocognoli's new-look Scotland squad.

Kim Hellberg made a triple change at half-time and Middlesbrough came out of the tunnel at a different speed. Amario Cozier-Duberry halved it five minutes after the restart with a deflected effort, and Will Lankshear headed in Ayling's cross just past the hour. Boro finished with twenty-two shots to eleven and fourteen corners to one, and still could not find a third. Max Crocombe had already denied Lankshear once; Vitek had to save from substitute Elkan Baggott at the other end to keep it level.

A point apiece was fair, and it cost Middlesbrough their perfect home record and the chance to go top. Millwall's first draw of the season came with a warning attached, because they had been two up and had not held it.

Three days after losing at home to his old club, Skubala made seven changes and got his clean sheet. Dom Ballard, restored for a third league start, met Rio Cardines' cross with a glancing header on the half-hour, and that was the game. It was Ballard's third goal since arriving from Leyton Orient in the summer and his first at Ashton Gate, and the 21-year-old spent a while afterwards talking about the noise it made.

Cardines, a defender on loan from Crystal Palace, registered a sixth assist of the season, which is a return most wingers would take for a whole campaign. Bristol City had seventeen shots to Watford's ten and seven on target to two, and should have buried it: Jason Knight headed the wrong side of the post from a few yards inside three minutes, and Tolaj lashed high and wide with only Federico Ravaglia to beat. Watford ended with 64.2% possession and two shots on target, which is a sentence that explains their season.

Both sides had strong penalty appeals waved away and Alessio Dionisi noted afterwards that there is no VAR at this level to settle it. Watford have now lost four of five, failed to score in three away games running, and go into the break with a threadbare squad and a lot of treatment tables to fill.

Birmingham have played four home league games this season and drawn all four, and this was the one that hurt. Max Arfsten put Middlesbrough ahead on the stroke of half-time after Cozier-Duberry cut in from the right and beat several attempted tackles before squaring. Liam Millar, on loan from Hull City since August, levelled with a first-time finish ten minutes into the second half. Four minutes after that a corner turned into a scramble, a Jay Stansfield header at the back post hit a number of bodies, and Riley McGree got the last touch into his own net.

Chris Davies' side were two minutes from a first home win of the season when Sebastian Berhalter's free-kick came in and James Beadle could not hold it. Adilson Malanda was quickest to the spill and forced it home for his first Middlesbrough goal. Beadle argued he had been fouled. Davies, who called it a sickening way to drop points, defended his keeper afterwards and said he had saved Birmingham plenty of times already.

Middlesbrough have now scored in twelve consecutive league games. They have also rescued a point from a losing position twice in four days, against Millwall on the Tuesday and again here, which took their season's tally from seven to eight.

Burnley have not won a league match since 11 February and they held the lead until the third minute of a five-minute stoppage period. Zeki Amdouni lost David Ozoh at a Lucas Pires corner on thirty-four minutes and headed in from close range, and Turf Moor settled in to defend a lead it did not deserve. Derby had seventeen shots to Burnley's six. Anel Ahmedhodzic cleared Sam Szmodics' goalbound shot, Connor Roberts blocked Bobby Clark, and Gregoire Coudert, making his Championship debut in place of the dropped Max Weiss, saved well from Ozoh.

Jamie Vardy came on for his home debut. Then, three minutes into stoppage time, Rhian Brewster fed fellow substitute Mo Fuseini and the Ghana midfielder, a deadline-day loan from Union Saint-Gilloise playing his fourth game for the club, drove low into the bottom corner.

That extends Burnley's winless league run to twenty matches. Only once before has it reached twenty or more, a run of twenty-four between April and November 1979. Nicky Hayen had called this one a must-win and dropped Kyle Walker for it, and afterwards said he understood why supporters were fuming, including with him.

Cardiff won a league game at the eighth time of asking, and Jack Moylan, who scored eleven and made six for Lincoln in League One last season, took two of the three. He opened it on eight minutes after Alex Robertson found Yousef Salech and Salech's deft touch sent him through. Sixteen minutes later Moylan turned provider, and Salech shrugged off Tyler Bindon to beat Arthur Okonkwo.

Charlton got one back before the half-hour through Tyreece Campbell, played in by Bindon and sliding it under Nathan Trott, and then spent the rest of the evening being kept in the game by their goalkeeper. Okonkwo, on loan from Wrexham, clawed a Moylan header off the line, with Joel Colwill putting the rebound wide from six yards, scrambled across to stop Salech's second, and after the break denied Colwill at the back post from Joel Bagan's cross. On the hour Moylan settled it anyway, smashing one in off the post from the edge of the area. Okonkwo was still at it afterwards, beaten by Ollie Tanner's run into the box and then not by his shot, and Moylan left to a standing ovation.

Cardiff finished with twenty-seven shots to six. Nathan Jones did not hide from it, saying his side were out-worked, out-battled, out-run, out-passed and out-thought, and that three big chances would only have papered over the cracks. Charlton started the season with three straight wins and top of the table; they have now gone five without one. The only sour note for Cardiff was Salech leaving with his arm in a sling after all the substitutions had gone.

For forty-five minutes Lincoln did to Swansea what they had done to Bristol City on Tuesday. Long throws, long balls, and a penalty when Josh Tymon tangled with Draper, which Reeco Hackett put away with some force. Swansea had most of the ball and one shot worth the name, an audacious Eli Just effort from halfway that George Wickens gathered at the second attempt.

Then Vitor Matos' side raised the tempo and the game turned over in four minutes. Melker Widell burst into the area and drilled a cross for Moussa Yeo to steer in, his second goal in as many games. Four minutes later Filip Lissah advanced down the right and squared for Stephen Eustaquio, whose shot flicked off Ryley Towler and left Wickens helpless. It was Eustaquio's first goal since he scored for Canada at the World Cup in the summer.

Swansea are back on top, a third away win in four on the road, and they got there partly because West Ham had dropped points at Millwall earlier in the day. Lincoln's five-game unbeaten league run ended. These two had not met since a fourth-tier game in April 2005, which the Imps won.

The first league meeting between these two since February 2012 was fourteen seconds old when Jenson Metcalfe went through Jarrod Bowen, and that set the terms. West Ham, in all white, did not touch the ball inside the Millwall box for half an hour. Caleb Taylor thumped in a loose ball on sixteen minutes after another Dykes long throw, with Konstantinos Mavropanos temporarily off the pitch receiving treatment. In first-half stoppage time Neghli controlled at the near post, took a touch to steady himself and finished. Two-nil, and deserved.

Nuno Espirito Santo went to a back three at the break and sent on Mohamadou Kante and Pablo for Kyle Walker-Peters and Joel Piroe, which changed the game because it changed the method. On seventy-four minutes Kante was given room well outside the box and drilled a low shot into the bottom corner. Six minutes later Mavropanos headed in Manor Solomon's cross at the far post for his fourth league goal of the season. Filip Marschall, a 23-year-old making his first league start in goal after a deadline-day move from Stevenage, made four saves across the afternoon and had appeared to suggest that Taty Castellanos spat at him.

It finished with Kante sent off in the closing seconds for hauling down substitute Kyrell Lisbie as he broke clear, and with Dykes skying the chance to win it in stoppage time. Alex Neil has now watched his side lead 2-0 at half-time twice in four days and come away with two points. His squad is threadbare, he has used three goalkeepers already, and the international break arrives at a good moment.

Fratton Park got a goal inside three and a half minutes, Jayden Meghoma's cross being headed away by Sean McLoughlin straight to Zak Swanson, who volleyed past the unsighted Balazs Toth. The lead lasted under seven. Harry Pickering found Oladapo Afolayan on the corner of the area, Afolayan got round Marlon Pack, and his low shot beat Daniel Bielica at the near post.

The second half turned on a Portsmouth error. Bielica's poor clearance was cut out by Kristi Montgomery, and Ryoya Morishita worked the ball to the right of the box and fired across the face of goal. That should have been that, except Colby Bishop, dropped to the bench after three goals in a year, came on and headed in Ryan Kavuma-McQueen's shot on seventy-four minutes. It was Bishop's first goal since April.

Kavuma-McQueen, seventeen and on loan from Chelsea, was involved in nearly everything Portsmouth did well. Meghoma almost won it in stoppage time and Toth saved. Both managers wanted more: John Mousinho called the two goals conceded entirely preventable, and Tony Mowbray thought his side showed Portsmouth too much respect.

Preston sacked Paul Heckingbottom the previous Sunday and were two goals up inside twenty-six minutes with Jason Euell in temporary charge. Johnny Kenny, signed from Celtic in the summer, latched on to Stan Mills' long ball with less than a minute gone and finished low. Then Dennis Cirkin was sent off on fifteen minutes for a dangerous late tackle on Leo Leroy, and Kenny spun in the box and lashed in a second.

QPR played the last seventy-five minutes with ten men and finished the afternoon with thirty-three shots. Kwame Poku pulled one back midway through the second half with a low drive from outside the box that beat Daniel Iversen. Andrija Vukcevic might have made it three at the other end, Pierce Charles saving. In the ninetieth minute Paul Smyth struck the equaliser, and the travelling support went quiet.

Euell's honesty afterwards was the most interesting thing said all afternoon: maybe they went two up too early, and being 2-0 ahead against ten men is not as easy as people say. Preston have lost six of eight, and the point spared them something no Preston side has managed in the club's history, which is losing seven of the first eight.

Three exceptional goals, and a game that lay flat for fifty minutes before the first of them arrived. Kalvin Phillips opened it early in the second half with a free-kick from wide on the left that everybody expected to be a cross. He bent it round a one-man wall into the bottom corner instead, his first league goal in more than five years and his first since returning to Sheffield United on a second loan from Manchester City.

With twelve minutes left Jack McGlynn was given time thirty yards out and hit it into the top corner. Eight minutes after that Sam Gallagher met Ethan Galbraith's searching pass on the half-volley and dipped it home, and the flag stayed down although he had looked offside when the ball was played. Stoke were not going to apologise for it. Mark Robins called Gallagher's finish brute force, power and quality, and pointed to the injuries the striker has come back from.

It extends Stoke's unbeaten run to five and ends the longest current away run in the division, Sheffield United having gone five on the road without defeat. Chris Wilder's side have now lost three in a row in all competitions. Before kick-off there was a minute's applause and black armbands for Harry Burrows, the former Stoke forward, who died earlier this month at 85.

Southampton had 65.9% of the ball, twenty shots to eight and seven on target to four, and lost to an own goal in the eighty-ninth minute. Jacques Ekomie's cross came into the six-yard box, Keven Schlotterbeck intercepted it, and the ball looped over Daniel Peretz and in. The Racecourse has not had many afternoons like it this season.

Kieffer Moore had put Wrexham ahead ten minutes before the interval, rising to head Ben Whiteman's corner beyond Peretz for his third of the campaign. The 34-year-old had started the previous game on the bench, a 6-0 defeat at West Ham that was Wrexham's heaviest Football League loss since 2004, and Phil Parkinson put him back in. Moore held the ball up, defended set-pieces, and went off to an ovation. James Ward-Prowse, back at Southampton three years after leaving for West Ham, had levelled five minutes after the break when Wrexham failed to clear.

Tonda Eckert said it was a game you can never lose, and he is right, and it is also the eighth Championship match in a row in which his side have conceded. Southampton have the second-best goal difference in the division at plus nine. They are thirteenth, because the EFL took four points off them for breaches of its regulations.

Atsuki Ito came on at Carrow Road, waited two minutes, and scored with his first touch. Norwich had failed to deal with Gavin Bazunu's long goal-kick, the Japan midfielder signed from Gent last month shifted the ball on to his left foot, and that was the seventh goal of an afternoon in which neither defence looked like it wanted the responsibility.

Norwich led twice and never once looked safe. Mohamed Toure lashed in from the edge of the area on five minutes for his sixth of the season, and Thierry Gale cut inside three minutes later to beat Vladan Kovacevic far too easily at his near post. Toure went off on fifteen minutes with a suspected dislocated shoulder. Ruairi McConville headed in Oscar Schwartau's corner for his first senior goal, the fifth set-piece Bolton have conceded this season. Gaizka Larrazabal's twenty-yard drive deflected off Ben Chrisene on forty-two minutes, Sam Dalby finished Kyliane Dong's pass two minutes into the second half, and Jack Stacey levelled it again on the hour from Paris Maghoma's pass.

Norwich finished with ten because Chrisene went off injured after every substitution had been used, and Norwich nearly headed a point in stoppage time from a McConville knock-down. They were booed off. They have lost 4-3 in consecutive Championship games, have not kept a clean sheet in fifteen, and their seventeen goals conceded is the joint worst in the division alongside Burnley. Bolton have won back-to-back Championship games for the first time since 2018.

Wolves had 45% of the ball and fifteen shots to seven, which is a way of saying they did not need possession to be the better team. Without the injured Raul Jimenez they went at Albion from the first whistle. Rodrigo Gomes, Marshall Munetsi and Adam Armstrong all went close before Max O'Leary somehow tipped Nasser Djiga's point-blank header on to the bar, and O'Leary then saved from Mateus Mane at his near post and stretched out an arm to deny Munetsi from Mane's cross.

The goal, when it came eight minutes after the break, was not a piece of football at all. Nat Phillips, under pressure from the Wolves press, underhit a backpass. Phillips had one Wolves player on his shoulder and failed to spot two more lurking behind him. Fer Lopez was the second of those, and he read it, nipping in to chip right-footed over the advancing O'Leary for his fourth Championship goal of the season.

It is Wolves' first home win in this fixture in fifteen years, and it lifts Cesar Peixoto's side above Albion into fourth on goal difference with a game in hand. James Morrison said his players were not brave enough on the ball and created too much anxiety in themselves. O'Leary, who kept the score to one, was the away side's best player by a distance.