Stalemate with Wigan Athletic leaves Barnsley seeking quality to pull clear of SkyBet Championship trouble

It does not take Hercule Poirot or Miss Marple to deduce where Barnsley are looking light in their own survival fight.

Results elsewhere in a gruesome battle against relegation may mean that the Reds are still just about in the game at the foot of the Championship.

But the flat body language and sagging shoulders of those in red told a thousand stories after the final whistle on Saturday. This was the big chance gone.

For Barnsley to stay up, something miraculous must now happen after a week which promised plenty but delivered little.

Two points from a possible nine from three matches against Wigan, Luton and Stoke. Underwhelming is the phrase.

The miracle is that Barnsley are not cast adrift, yet that is the Championship and is testament to the ineptitude of a number of sides in the bottom seven – several of whom are likely to stay up by default at this rate.

For Barnsley, there is plenty of heart and willing. Effort is not an issue, but quality is. Where it matters, there is presently no method, self-assurance or aplomb in the final third.

Not sharp enough, as Gerhard Struber succinctly put it, with Barnsley palpably lacking the wit to break down a regimented Wigan backline – even when Danny Fox departed the scene early.

In the opening third of the season ahead of Struber’s arrival, Barnsley’s wretched defensive statistics – they were conceding an average of around two goals per game – headed the chargesheet.

Now, the problems are further forward.

Only Middlesbrough have scored fewer goals than Barnsley’s haul of 46. Yes, the Oakwell outfit have not conceded a goal on home soil since football’s resumption, but a tally of four goals in their past eight home matches is rather more damning.

Barnsley’s top-scorer has not scored in eight matches with Cauley Woodrow’s frustration when he kicked out at an advertising hoarding when he was substituted just after the hour mark there to see. At the moment, he is running on empty.

Conor Chaplin has scored just twice in his past 16 league matches, while Jacob Brown has netted on just two occasions in the Championship since late October.

There is palpably no sense of a Plan B other than throwing on a big centre-half in the dying stages of the game to make a nuisance of himself up top in Aapo Halme.

Desperate times bring desperate measures.

Just as Barnsley lacked a defensive figure of stature before the arrival of Michael Sollbauer, so their absence of an experienced Championship savvy forward who has miles on the clock and is someone to follow is now being exposed when it matters.

Listen to the Reds players and the fight goes on, but you have to wonder.

Next up is a trip to Elland Road followed by a home game against Nottingham Forest and a fixture at a free-and-easy Brentford.

Should Barnsley survive, it will be one of the stories of the season.

Midfielder Marcel Ritzmaier commented: “Of course (we can still stay up). That is not a good question.

“We have nothing to lose and we can play with a free mood and of course, we respect our opponents.

“Leeds is a big team and I am very convinced we can get some points.

“In the last games, we played really good games and the style was very good. On the performances on the pitch, there is nothing to say we cannot stay up.

“We give everything and everybody is confident and if we keep that for the next three games, there are a lot of possibilities.

“We know we are a good team and we can just make a surprise.”

At the moment, performances do not matter a jot. Points do.

Towards the conclusion of a week that must have been physically and mentally exhausting, Wigan’s performance levels dipped from their 2020 highs, perhaps understandably.

Barnsley lacked the gumption to cash in, although they were not helped by the lenient refereeing of David Webb, whose failure to red card Antonee Robinson for a wild challenge on Kilian Ludewig who was sent spiralling into the air in the 38th minute drew rightful censure.

That could have changed the narrative of the game much earlier, but it is a moot point as to whether Barnsley would have filled their boots in any case.

The best first-half moment saw David Marshall make a scampering save to deny Brown, while only a brilliant last-ditch challenge by defender Sollbauer thwarted Kieran Dowell before the break.

At the other end, Sollbauer passed up the chance to be the unlikely goalscoring hero on the resumption, with Styles going close amid the frenzy at the end.

It was all very manic, but all very predictable.

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