Cardiff City 2 - Millers 0. Match Report

Thorne's opener came when he rose at the back post to head in a cross from Chris Barker.

He repeated the dose 15 minutes from time with another towering header from a corner by the impressive Gary O'Neil.

City skipper Graham Kavanagh resumed his place in the Cardiff engine room after his one-match ban but there was no place in the Merry Millers starting line-up for Richie Barker, whose brother Chris was at left-back for the Bluebirds.

It was Kavanagh who almost made the breakthrough after 20 minutes when he met a nod down from Thorne but he blasted his volley well wide of the visitors goal.

Fouled??

The Milers had a penalty claim turned down midway through the half when Tony Warner appeared to foul Mark Burchill after Tony Vidmar had allowed a throughball to casually drift past him into the danger area.

The first half drew to a close with neither side really troubling the other, fitting perhaps for two clubs struggling at the bottom of the league.

Rotherham had only scored one goal away from home so it was not surprising that their first corner did not arrive until the 49th minute.

City went ahead six minutes later with the best move of the game, a swift break out of defence gave Barker the chance to put over a far post cross to the waiting Thorne who headed in for Cardiff's first goal at Ninian Park in five matches.

Just on the hour Joe Ledley replaced the injured Paul Parry for his league debut.

In the 75th minute Thorne doubled the tally with a huge leap to meet an O'Neil corner his header went past the diving Mike Pollitt and into the corne

r of the net.

That second goal settled City's nerves and they began passing the ball about with a bit of flair led by O'Neil who was showing just why Portsmouth rate him so highly.

Alan Lee had a chance to get on the scoresheet in the closing stages, but Pollitt came out to block his shot and Ledley struck the rebound wide.