Barnsley grab last-gasp equaliser against Bristol City to climb off foot of Championship table

Barnsley 2 Bristol City 2

If it was a night for a former Barnsley manager to rue, it may allow Adam Murray to follow in Lee Johnson’s footsteps by getting the Oakwell job.

Johnson’s Bristol City were heading for the heights of the automatic promotion places when Ashley Williams and Andreas Weimann gave them a 2-0 lead but Barnsley mounted a spirited comeback to enhance caretaker manager Murray’s chances of replacing the sacked Daniel Stendel.

While Barnsley are on their longest winless run since 1959, Aapo Halme and Cauley Woodrow earned Murray a third creditable point in four games in charge to take them off the foot of the table. Barnsley have compiled a shortlist of lesser-known candidates and interviewed Poya Asbaghi, the 34-year-old who has taken IFK Gothenburg to seventh in the Swedish league, which concludes on Saturday.

But it went wrong before it eventually went right for Murray. Barnsley have got the division’s worst defensive record and they demonstrated why as their zonal-marking system failed twice. Johnson lost his injured captain Josh Brownhill but City benefited as his replacement, Niclas Eliasson, set up both goals with his set-piece expertise. The unmarked Williams headed in his free kick before Weimann, who had been denied by goalkeeper Brad Collins seconds earlier, struck for a second successive game. He met Eliasson’s corner with a looping header to get his sixth goal of the season.

But Barnsley should have taken the lead. In a sorry season, they have tended to be at their best against the better teams. They began brighter and were twice denied by Daniel Bentley. First the goalkeeper denied the lively Mallik Wilks, tipping his curling shot wide. Then he did still better to tip Conor Chaplin’s close-range effort on to the neat post.

Bentley was eventually beaten as Halme headed in Alex Mowatt’s corner before top scorer Woodrow struck in injury time to salvage a point.

Match details

Barnsley (3-4-1-2):Collins; Diaby, Halme, Sibbick; Cavare, Dougall, Mowatt, Brown (Simoes, 81); Chaplin (Schmidt); Woodrow, Wilks (Thomas, 58).
Substitutes not used: Radlinger (g), Andersen, McGeehan, Oduor.
Booked: Diaby, Thomas.
Goals: Halme (77), Woodrow (90+4).
Bristol City (3-5-2): Bentley; Moore (Baker, 72), Williams, Kalas; Pereira, Brownhill (Eliasson, 30), Massengo, O’Dowda, Rowe; Watkins (Semenyo, 73), Weimann.
Substitutes not used: Maenpaa (g), Wright, Rodri, Palmer.
​Goals: Williams (43), Weimann (71).
Referee: Jarred Gillet (Australia).
Attendance: 12,178.