Nottingham Forest 2 v Birmingham City 1 - EFL Championship

Spring time arrives in West Bridgford upon Trent

Saturday 3rd March 2018
SkyBet EFL Championship
at the City Ground, Nottingham
Nottingham Forest (1) 2
Joe Lolley 6
Matty Cash 79
Birmingham City (0) 1
Michael Morrison 87
Admission £23. Programme £3.
Attendance 23,296 (inc. 1,991 away fans)

Nottingham Forest:
Costel Pantilimon, Tendayi Darikwa, Tobias Figueiredo, Danny Fox, Ben Osborn, Ben Watson (C), Jack Colback, Matty Cash, Lee Tomlin (Adlene Guedioura 72), Joe Lolley, Ben Brereton (Daryl Murphy HT)
Unused subs - Stefanos Kapino, Michael Mancienne, Kieran Dowell, Apostolos Vellios, Joe Worrall
Birmingham City:
David Stockdale,  Carl Jenkinson, Michael Morrison (C), Harlee Dean, Maxime Colin, Jason Lowe (Lucas Jutkiewicz 65), Craig Gardner, Maikel Kieftenbeld, Jacques Maghoma (Jeremie Boga 80), Che Adams, Sam Gallagher
Unused subs - Connal Trueman, Marc Roberts, Cohen Bramall, Cheikh Ndoye, Jota

An artistic impression of former Reds and Blues player
Trevor Francis scoring in the 1979 European cup final.

The last time these two sides met, was at St. Andrew's, back in November, a fifth minute Che Adams goal and a decent shift by goalkeeper Tomasz Kuszczak, was enough to give Blues a 1-0 win in front of a 21,071 crowd.
So I guess you could could say that today was payback time... as the home side shoved Birmingham deeper into the brown sticky stuff with this narrow victory, that started with an early goal and concluded with a beyond the call of duty, display by the giant Reds keeper, Costel Pantilimon, who made a string of vital and brave saves.

Many years ago, I saw the Lurkers play at the Rowing Club
that stands to the right side of this picture #punkanddisordely

Fifteenth placed Nottingham Forest started this afternoon's game ten points ahead of their visitors from the West Midlands, so obviously they're now thirteen points in front of them, by virtue of this tight squeeze of a win, in spite of a late 'do or die' cavalry charge by City, 'Cotterill's last stand' you might say, that had the hosts on the back foot towards the end of the game.
It was obviously not going to be Birmingham's day, when the Forest goalie actually tipped the kitchen sink that Blues had thrown at him over his bar in stoppage time, just before the home sides captain Ben Watson scuffed a nerve jangling touch towards his own goal, but narrowly missed the target, much to his obvious relief.

And you thought that people who go out to watch football
matches in sub zero temperatures were all chuffin' bonkers.

Aitor Karanka's side had beaten Queens Park Rangers 5-2 last weekend at Loftus Road, while Blues had a nightmare of an afternoon, losing 2-0 at home against Barnsley, a result that saw them slip back into the relegation places.
Elsewhere in the Championship, on Tuesday night, Hull City and Barnsley played out a 1-1 draw at the KC Stadium, in what was both team's game in hand over Birmingham City.

That means the Tigers (who didn't have a scheduled fixture today) are three points ahead of Blues and one in

The Bridgford Fish Bar & Restaurant.
A highly recommended THE66POW Five Star ***** Food Emporium.
Even I didn't want any tea when I got home..

front of the Tykes... while Reading and Bolton Wanderers, for their part in the mad scramble to avoid the drop into League 1, both have a point more than Hull.
And all of the teams above Blues in the table had a better goal difference than Steve Cotterill's side too... which in the main, stems from the fact, that when Michael Morrison headed Graig Gardner's eighty seventh minute into the back of Pantilimon's net, a staggering four hundred and ninety two minutes had elapsed since Birmingham's last league goal, when Jota had put them 3-0 up on the stroke of half time at Hillsborough against Sheffield Wednesday.

The state of play prior to today's games

Furthermore, Burton Albion are one point behind Blues (but with a worse goal difference) and bottom club Sunderland two points (with a better goal difference) after they picked up a point from a credible 1-1 draw at Millwall today. Has anybody got a calculator that I can borrow to keep top side of all of the permutations?
Today saw the Barnsley v Norwich City, Sheffield United v Burton Albion and Wolves v Reading games (that had a bearing on the relegation places) postponed, due to the kind of weather that is heralding the onset of Spring in this green and pleasant land of ours at this current time.

Back in the day, Forest were dead famous.

Aston Villa v Queens Park Rangers and Brentford v Cardiff City were also called off.
So much for all the talk of a Winter break.
Bolton Wanderers lost 3-1 at home to Preston North End in the Lancashire derby, while Sheffield Wednesday went down 4-0 at Bristol City. Though the Owls should have enough points to steer clear of the drop zone; with eleven games still to go, their seven point gap above the bottom three, could still be whittled away, if they don't start to find some form pretty soon.

And the scores on the doors after today's games

Over the past couple of days, in the build up to the game, rumours began to circulate, from some very reliable sources, and then built up a real head of steam, that in the aftermath of this game, Steve Cotterill, the Blues (and former Forest) manager was being relieved of his duties, and is going to be replaced by Garry Monk, who is apparently bringing in his entourage of Pep Clotet as his assistant, along with James Beattie in a coaching capacity.

'Tricky Trev'. Still revered in the East and West Midlands

Well, half of that prophecy has come true at the time of writing... and Cotterill is no longer occupying the Birmingham City hot seat (ejector seat) as of this evening... and I can't imagine that it will be too long until Monk and his team are officially unveiled as the next in a long line of managers, to have been employed by Birmingham City over the last sixteen months.
Is Monk the answer to the clubs woes? Or is he destined to become just another short term appointment, whose only destiny is to become yet another scapegoat for the piss poor manner in which Blues are being run into the ground, by the powers that be at the club?
Let's hope not, eh!?

The bloke who patented the manufacturing of revolving doors must be making a fortune from having them installed at football grounds, for numerous manager's offices this season.
Having replaced Steve Evans at Leeds United, Monk was in charge at Yorkshire's 'sleeping giants' for eleven months, before moving on, and he was given the push at Middlesbrough in December, after just six months in that particular job, where he was subsequently replaced by Tony Pulis, who had been dismissed by West Bromwich Albion a month earlier.
For the record, Middlesbrough won the opening Championship fixture of this snowbound weekend, 3-0

against Leeds United at the Riverside Stadium last night.
If/when* Monk takes the Birmingham job (and I think that one can confidently assume, that he already actually has done), the first opponents he'll be pitted against are, ironically: Middlesbrough, who visit St. Andrew's on Tuesday night.
If the Championship was being screened as a soap opera this season, you could be forgiven for changing channels, on the strength of it being overly far fetched.
Football could learn a lot from taking note of the intriguing story-lines, sub plots and quality scriptwriters that are utilised by Hollyoaks, in my humble opinion. But then again, I could have just dropped a random sentence into this long winded overview of today's events to see if you're still taking any notice.

Back by popular demand, another exciting instalment of the 'Hitchy and Stocky' pre-match warm up routine show.
And anybody who doesn't know who Kevin Hitchcock is, should bugger off right now, because you're reading the wrong effing blog.
Hopefully the Blues goalkeeping coach will escape the imminent cull of staff at the club.

On the strength of today's result, I reckon that Forest are (more or less) clear of any danger now, in fact, at times this afternoon, they looked to be a work in progress, putting down some promising foundations for a better campaign ahead next time round. If you've already got the cornerstones in, there is no time like the present to get a head start on the opposition.
Blues fate this season is still, just about, in their own hands, but they're rapidly running out of time and chances to turn things round and shake off the unwanted record, of having lost more games than any other side in the whole of the Championship this term.
But their 22.86% win ration thus far (I worked it out in the margin) is roughly the same as Sheffield Wednesday, Bolton Wanderers and Reading's and better than Hull City, Barnsley, Burton Albion and Sunderland's.

I guess your optimism level, as regards the imminent run in to the season, depends on whether the plastic bottle that you chuck at the outgoing manager is half empty or half full.
Hull City and Burton Albion still have to visit St. Andrew's this month and Birmingham travel to Bolton Wanderers for a midweek 'all or nothing' clash on April 3rd. It's not over yet!
In 1924, a fifty four year old composer by the name of Henry Lauder, wrote a song that contains the following stirring prose: "Though your tired and weary still journey on, 'til you come to your happy abode, where all the love you've been dreaming of will be there at the end of the road"
Once again, might I suggest, that if you're not au fait with the significance of the words to this uplifting and rousing anthem, then you have most definitely just accidentally stumbled across the wrong blog to read.

Forest got off to the best of starts imaginable to them, when, with just six minutes on the clock, Lee Tomlin played the ball to his right, into the path of Ben Lolley, who sprinted forward twenty yards and aimed a left footed shot towards the bottom left hand corner of the goal in front of him from outside the area, that ended up in the back of the net even though David Stockdale got a touch to the ball with both hands, down to his right.
Maikel Kieftenbeld had a great opportunity in the fifteenth minute, but spurned the chance and launched his close strike high into the Trent End, after Jacques Maghoma and beaten Ben Osborn for pace on  the right hand side of the Reds goalmouth, before pulling the ball back and putting it on a plate for Kieftenbeld, who, on his return from suspension had more time on the ball than he realised, to weigh up his options and opt for precision rather than pace and power.

Blues were soon back on the attack, and though Craig Gardner's free kick delivery from out on the left, evaded Carl Jenkinson, Harlee Dean collected the ball to the right hand side of the six yard box,
but put the ball wide of the near post when he lashed it back towards the Forest goal.
Both sides were stringing a lot of passes together and patiently looking for an opening, and as half time approached, Sam Gallagher had half a chance to grab an equaliser, when he made himself some space on the edge of the Reds area and took aim, but Jack Colback moved across quickly to snuff the move out.
HT: Reds 1 v Blues 0
Lolley played a defence splitting sideways pass across Blues area to Matty Cash, whose crashing effort looked destined for the roof of the net, until Stockdale did magnificently to twist and turn the ball just over his bar.

"Oi Graig! Hit it towards the back stick for Morrison to score with a header"

Lee Tomlin opened up the way to goal for Tendayi Darikwa through the right channel, and once again Forest were thwarted by Stockdale as he turned the resulting shot round the upright.
Lukas Jutkiewicz was sent on from  the bench, in an effort to beef up Blues attacking options and he almost made an immediate impact, but his flicked header from Gardner's corner was kept out by Pantilimon, who would prove to be pivotal in his sides win this afternoon, as he commanded his goalmouth like a man possessed, making two saves in quick succession from Gallagher and Jutkiewicz.

Blues won a free kick out on the right, but instead of dropping the ball into the six yard box, they tried to over complicate things... and  when Gardner and Kieftenbeld got in a muddle between themselves and had to play an  awkward ball back towards their own half, which Maxime Colin struggled to deal with and he conceded a throw in near the halfway line.
The visitors big guns were all up the field in anticipation of a better taken free kick, so Forest quickly set about taking the throw in and Ben Osborn launched a diagonal pass to pick out the run of Cash on the right of the pitch, who motored forward and struck an unstoppable angled shot past Stockdale.
2-0 down, going into the final ten minutes, that long, long road had just had a new ten mile stretch added to the end of it. And Blues had all but laid the foundations for it themselves.

The Forest fans sang "Sacked in the morning!" towards Steve Cotterill, the same manager who had saved them from relegation not so long ago (football supporters are a fickle bunch sometimes, aren't they!?), while, if truth be told, his tenure at St. Andrew's was about to be terminated much sooner than tomorrow morning.
But the unease of home crowd grew, as they began to sense, that even at this late stage of the game, the tide might actually still be about to turn, as Forest were forced to defend in numbers, while Birmingham began to swarm forward.
Lolley had already been awarded with the man of the match award, before Pantilimon, put in a late bid (too late), to claim the prize for himself, as Blues bombarded the home sides area with a frequent succession of crosses.

With three minutes remaining, Gardner launched a right wing corner towards Morrison at the back post, by way of a thirtieth birthday present for the central defender, who thumped a header past Pantilimon, to set up an all hands to the pumps, grandstand finish, and the ante was upped still further when Mr Ben Toner, the fourth official, raised the board to indicate that there would be four added minutes.

Watson almost turned the ball past his own keeper, as he desperately tried to divert it wide and clear his lines, but in spite of putting their hosts under the cosh for the closing minutes of the game, that illusive second Blues goal just wouldn't come... and Forest held onto the three points.
Both sides deserved something out of the game, but that's not how the football fates share out the spoils.
FT: Nottingham Forest 2 v Birmingham City 1

On the way back to my car I had this odd feeling that I was being followed.

Both teams return to action on Tuesday night, with Blues entertaining Middlesbrough at home, while Forest travel down (and across) to Norfolk, to face Norwich City.

Next Weekend, Birmingham are away at Cardiff City on Saturday, while Aitor Karanka's Reds face Derby County at the City Ground on Sunday, in an East Midlands local derby.
Footnote:
Added Sunday 4th march 2018 at 18:30PM
Garry Monk has been announced as the new Birmingham City manager.
He's signed a three and a half year contract and brings with him: Pep Clotet, James Beattie and Darryl Flahavan as his back up team.