Sheffield Wednesday 1 v Birmingham City 1 - EFL Championship

Tuesday 1st January 2019
SkyBet EFL Championship
at Hillsborough Stadium
Sheffield Wednesday (1) 1
Steven Fletcher 18
Birmingham City (0) 1
Che Adams 48
Attendance: 29,462

And now for something completely different...well it certainly makes a change from slipping and sliding about on muddy grass banking in the bucketing rain and gale force winds, while tip-toeing precariously over multiple heaps of dog mess, on the perimeter of some open to the elements County Senior League ground.

Not that such a character building experience isn't without a certain kind of charming appeal and of course, also contains copious elements of self-righteous affirmation that you're a proper 'holier than thou' football sort, for having endured such conditions, just to watch twenty two men kicking a faux leather sphere of wind around, while the other four spectators (and their dog) who turned out on such a foul day, buggered off back to their cars and went home ages ago, probably just after half time.

Today however, I am being a complete 'sell-out', betraying my roots, turning my back on my own kind and abandoning the oi-polloi, while no doubt breaking every sort of imaginable football watching code and convention you ever adhered to, by abandoning the grassy banks, the windswept terraces and even the rain specked tip up plastic seats... and observing this afternoon's Championship fixture between Sheffield Wednesday and Birmingham City, from the posh padded seats, via the hospitality dining area, with my esteemed guest for the day... the missus!

You see, it's not really her fault, but she was born into a family who were predominantly Sheffield Wednesday supporters, hence that little curly tail she has, along with that often overwhelming desire to eat out of a trough and live in a sty, while happily rolling around in 'muck' with her own kind... which is why, I generously agree to accompany her to Hillsborough for a game once per year, so that she can wallow in nostalgic remembrance of her older relatives, who used to visit the blue side of the 'Steel  City' divide, but who are sadly no longer with us.

I mean, how on earth was I supposed to know, that on the very day that I was treating 'our lass' to a bit of comfort at the football, by way of my heartfelt appreciation for all of her efforts in making the Xmas season such a joyous and memorable occasion in our happy abode these past few weeks; that Birmingham City would be arriving at Hillsborough too, at precisely the same time we were going to be visiting South Yorkshire?
And no... she isn't a great believer in coincidences either.

Our 'comfort zone' for the afternoon's entertainment is the 'Springett Suite'.
And it is thus named because...
Both Ron and Peter Springett (brothers, who were born in Fulham) were goalkeeping siblings... and they both played for Sheffield Wednesday. When Peter joined the Owls from Queens Park Rangers in 1967, Ron moved in the opposite direction from Hillsborough to Loftus Road, in a swap deal. Ron had played for QPR previously, but joined Wednesday for a fee of £10,000 in 1958, and while at the South Yorkshire club, he established himself as the regular keeper for England, winning thirty three caps between 1959 and 1966.

Peter also represented his country, at U23 level.
In between his two spells with QPR, Ron made 345 first team appearances for the Owls, while Peter turned out 180 times for the club, before he moved on to Barnsley in 1975, and subsequently saw out the latter years of his career at Scarborough and Frickley Athletic.
Although Ron played for England during the 1962 World Cup in Chile, he won his last cap in a friendly game

against Norway, (a 1-6 away win) in June 1966, just before that year's tournament in England, where he was allocated the number twelve shirt in the final against West Germany, and though he wasn't presented with a medal on the actual day (because he was an unused substitute); he finally received one forty three years later, from the UK Prime Minister of the time, Gordon Brown, in a ceremony at number 10 Downing Street.

The meal itself, the hospitality, ambience of the surroundings, friendliness of all of the staff and the pre-match entertainment, was all first rate and I wouldn't hesitate to use this match day option again, should the occasion arise... and the blonde Beelzebub said she could happily get used to this sort of thing on a regular basis too. For the benefit of the frugal misers amongst you all, the cost of all of this represented great value for money too. 

Going all trip adviser on you for a few moments, I'm going to award the whole experience a ten out of ten. The neutrals, Owls and Blues supporters in the Springett Suite, all seemed to be similarly happy with their lot too. 

The package included a three course Indian buffet meal (apparently it's a breakfast menu for the earlier kick off this coming weekend), with a well stocked sweet cart that my guest wanted to take home, a reserved table, best grandstand seats, programmes, team sheets and unlimited warm drinks prior to (at half time) and after the game. As regards treating Mein Bunkerführer to a bit of luxury, the day was a roaring success... and if we'd just got tickets for the game and eaten elsewhere during the day, it would actually cost us more.

Having replaced Carlos Carvalhal as their manager a little under a year ago with Jos Luhukay, the Owls subsequently fired Carvalhal's successor a couple of weeks ago, just before Christmas, and instilled Lee Bullen in the role of temporary caretaker manager, though it is the worst kept secret in football, that it's a signed, sealed and delivered deal, that the former Blues manager: Steve Bruce is waiting in the wings to make his curtain call in the Hillsborough hot seat any time now.

Ex-Owls defender and captain: Mike Pickering on the mic.

In total, besides Blues, the incoming Owls boss has managed eight other clubs to date, including Birmingham's local rivals: Aston Villa and Wednesday's neighbours: Sheffield United. In 2016, he was also interviewed for the post of England manager. Blimey! Hold onto that thought for a moment.
But even though Bruce is being installed in the Wednesday job, probably within the next twenty four hours, it needs to be said that Bullen hasn't been doing a bad job of late either, and this afternoon's hard working team performance, meant that the Owls have clocked up an unbeaten run of four games, including two wins, under his guidance.

Today's visitors are no strangers to the managerial merry-go-round themselves.
Garry Monk has been Birmingham's manager since March 2018 and he's subsequently won the hearts and minds, and more importantly: the trust, of the Birmingham faithful, reviving the clubs fortunes on the pitch and steadying an unstable situation off of it. When he took the job, Monk became the fifth new manager (including caretaker boss Lee Carsley's three game tenure) at St. Andrew's in short space of time, since the departure of Gary Rowett in December 2016. I wonder what ever became of him!?

But enough of this speculation, backtracking and gossip, and on with the day's main event. 

No! Not another visit to the sweet cart at half time Mrs W! 

But the altogether more serious matter of the EFL Championship fixture, we're actually here to watch today.

Blues squad is being stretched to it's limits at present... and those who are manning the bridge throughout this successful but very demanding campaign, are making a really good fist of things, but some of them are obviously beginning to look jaded, especially those who've been

playing through the pain barrier, or who are returning from injury, like Jota for example, who would possibly have benefited for a slightly longer recovery period, but needs must... and credit where it's due for the consistent run of results they're grinding out against the odds. 

The Owls stand in manager noted in his post match press interview, that his side had the legs over their opponents today and looked fresher than Blues.
He made a fair point on both counts; but by far the most spritely, lively and focused individual on the whole pitch, was the Birmingham keeper Lee Camp, who pulled off a

string of saves that effectively earned Blues their point, just as much as Che Adams equalising goal did just after the half time break. Camp had to be on top of his game, because the Owls probably had around an 80% sized portion of any attacking play on display today, but in his own inimitable style, the Northern Ireland international pulled off a string of great saves... and truth be told, Wednesday's goal, a neat finish on the turn from Steven Fletcher in the eighteenth minute, who collected the ball with his back to goal, when Tom Lees knocked down

Barry Bannan's long free kick towards the Owls number nine; possibly only ended up in the net because Camp saw the ball late, with Harlee Dean breathing down Fletcher's neck and obstructing his view... not that I'm trying to take anything away from the clever and clinical finish by the Wednesday striker, nor attach any blame to Dean, who was merely doing exactly what he was supposed to be doing and was a tower of strength for the visitors this afternoon.
Either way, it was a quality finish and it wasn't exactly Wednesday's first effort on goal either, as they made a lively start to the game.

Dean made a goal line clearance as Fletcher diverted a ball from Marco Matias over the advancing Camp, but the linesman had raised his flag anyway, having spotted that Fletcher had climbed on Wes Harding to gain the height required to actually reach the ball.
While Birmingham, in the main, were restricted to a few long range shots and free kick routines outside the Wednesday area... and as half time arrived, on the balance of things thus far, going in at the break just the one goal behind, probably represented a decent outcome for the battling Blues.
HT: Owls 1 v Blues 0

"We're Birmingham City, we'll fight 'til the end!", as the song goes... and sure enough, Garry Monk's play off contenders came back out for the second half on the front foot, and via a trademark Michael Morrison long pass towards Lukas Jutkiewicz, that was flicked on into the path of Che Adams, the in-form marksman swept his only clear cut chance of the game past Keiren Westwood to level the score, three minutes after the restart and claim his twelfth goal of the season.

Adam Reach forced Camp into making another save, pushing the ball away into the path of Fletcher, whose effort was blocked by Gary Gardner.

Camp pulled off at least half a dozen saves, demonstrating the kind of agility that Spiderman himself would've been proud of. A disgruntled Owls fan sat within earshot of the 'Lesser Spotted Cake Munching Gannet' and myself, was overheard decrying Camp's handling the of the ball, calling out: "It's not a wet bar of soap!", but you'd have to be fairly blinkered not to concede that whatever else you might want to say about the visitors keeper's sometimes unorthodox style, he was the man of the match today, by quite some way.

All of the current goalkeeping coaches and manuals talk of punching and getting the modern day lightweight and often slippery ball away from the immediate danger zone, instead of trying to catch it; so... shut the **** up! And get up to date with your archaic perceptions of the game dickhead!

Mind you, the same individual called out: "Superb challenge! Sublime Barry Lad!", when Bannan got away with a studs up challenge a few minutes later, so he was probably just letting his bias cloud his judgement... pretty much the same as the rest of us do from time to time.

Substitute Craig Gardner, replaced his brother Gary with ten minutes remaining and almost won the game for the visitors, with a dipping free kick that glanced off the wrong side of the right hand upright, after Morgan Fox had fouled Adams a few yards outside the Owls area. 

Wednesday missed a trick, in my opinion, that might have turned the game in their favour, but I guess we'll never know; when they introduced Atdhe Nuhiu from the bench, at least ten minutes after they should've done.

The Kosovan international, is a big, awkward and sometimes clumsy looking lump of a player, but he's horrible to play against, especially for a tiring defence late in the game where they've given their all in a backs to the wall display of unrelenting dogged tenacity (yes, I did get a new Dictionary for Christmas) and it was Nuhiu who almost snatched a late win for the Owls, when he plundered his way through Blues defence, like a bull in a china shop and forced a block form Camp, before testing the visitors keeper again off of the rebound... while Adam Reach failed to find the target when the loose ball from Camp's second save fell to him.
FT: Sheffield Wednesday 1 v Birmingham City 1

Since offloading Jos Luhukay, Wednesday look to have addressed the downward spiral that they've been on, while Blues continued to confound their detractors and redefine the word resilience.
And though the Owls fans could argue that they did enough to warrant a win today, Blues (and Lee Camp in particular) obviously did enough to keep them at bay... albeit by the skin of their teeth.

Anyone who's ever sat in the traffic jams around Hillsborough after a game, especially when the crowd figure is as big as it was today, will understand why I returned to the warmth of the Springett Suite to watch the results and get some more coffee down my neck until things had quietened down a bit on the roads... save for a few Kamikaze pilots practising manoeuvres on the M1 going home

I'd recommended the comfortable match day experience option that we enjoyed today to anyone, whichever team they're supporting. 

This coming weekend, I'll be back amongst the rank and file commoners at three FA Cup Third round matches: West Ham United v Birmingham City and Crystal Palace v Grimsby Town on Saturday, and Sheffield United v Barnet on Sunday... for some reason my spouse has declined to join me at the latter one of those games. Possibly because they don't serve an extensive patisserie selection at the Pukka Pie counter in the South Stand at Bramall Lane.

Footnote:

Aspiring young sports writer Devon Cash, who covers Sheffield Wednesday and Worksop Town games had the following to say about today's game: CLICK HERE. Happy New Year Devon... and KEEP RIGHT ON!