Birmingham City 0 v Millwall 2 - EFL Championship

Wednesday 13th March 2019
SkyBet EFL Championship
at St. Andrew's Stadium
Birmingham City (0) 0
Millwall (2) 2
Ben Thompson 13, 32
Attendance: 20,151 (inc. 466 away fans)

Birmingham City:

Camp, Harding, Dean, Morrison, Pedersen; Mrabti (Maghoma 59), G Gardner, Kieftenbeld (C Gardner HT), Mahoney; Vassell (Jutkiewicz 59), Adams.

Unused subs - Dacres-Cogley, Davis, Jota, Trueman.

Millwall:

Martin, Romeo, Pearce, Cooper, Ferguson; Wallace (Hutchinson 90), Tunnicliffe, Thompson, Marshall (Meredith 84); Leonard; Gregory (Morison 66).

Unused subs - Elliott, Williams, O’Brien, Archer.

"No-one likes us! No-one likes us! No-one likes us! We don't care!"
It's a song that the Millwall fans have used as their anthem for many years.
But, perhaps, looking at all of the back (and front) page news coverage that Birmingham City have been getting since Sunday, and scrolling through all of the 'expert' reaction on social media, where the faux-guardians of the game have been queuing up to put the boot in on Birmingham City and all of it's fans, while getting a solid hard on pointing northbound on their moral compass; maybe those lovable Lions from the Isle of Dogs, should consider abdicating the ownership of their defiant battle-cry, to the team that everyone apparently hates and holds in such low regard at this moment in time, after the antics of one person, who is currently behind bars for the crimes he committed (that have been roundly condemned by the football club), but have still turned them into the current whipping boys of the football world.

There were also pitch invaders at Hibs v Rangers and Arsenal v Manchester United at the weekend... and although three wrongs don't make a right, how many of the figures within the game who are now calling for Birmingham to be hammered with a weighty punishment, might have been involved at other clubs where supporters and even players have misbehaved previously... and are really in no sort of position to be preaching their holier than thou diatribe from a whiter than white platform.
I could list numerous instances, but I won't.
Instead I'll politely suggest: let those who are without sin cast the first stone, or just shut the fuck up!

Dear reader... I ask you: do you support, or attach yourself to any football club in particular?
And if your answer to that question is yes: Do they have a minority faction of fans who thrive on misbehaving to 'earn' some level of notoriety and kudos among their peers?
I can answer that one for you myself, because I know that all clubs have them.
And does your club have any embarrassing individuals who follow them, who you wish would bugger off somewhere else instead, but you have to, or at least are prepared to tolerate these imbeciles as a part of your match day experience, because your only other option would be to stay away from games altogether?
Of course you do.
So cast down your rocks, disperse your hate mob and leave Birmingham City alone to deal with their own issues... which in case you've missed that bit of this whole sorry saga, they already have done, as swiftly and thoroughly as is practicably possible.

Did you ever stop to think, that by surveying the bigger picture, that maybe we all need to take a closer look at ourselves... and I include myself in that sweeping generalisation. Because as we grew up (well, some of you did), watching football, amid a culture of partisan tribalism, ribald hatred and gang culture, played out to the background of a soundtrack that included angrily chanted references to air disasters, deaths in football grounds, shitting on and kicking the fuck out of local rival teams, political, religious and racial differences, slurs about sexuality and thoroughly despising any fellow human being who might just happen to support a different football team, or live a few miles away from your own town/city. And to one extreme or another, I'd wager that 90% of people reading this recognise some if not all, of their own traits from days gone by among that list.
Paul Mitchell is an idiot, of the worst order, who deserved a far more serious slap on the wrists than the one he got.
But as uncomfortable as you might be with the suggestion; how much have you personally contributed to developing the culture that encourages morons like him to behave the way he did at the weekend? I'm not blaming anybody else, just suggesting that we can all take on board what happened and learn from it, in our own way.

If this comes across like I'm in some way condoning or excusing Mitchell's actions... I'm not!
Things would've been a whole lot better if he hadn't got onto the pitch and reached Jack Grealish. But, unless people can take a long hard look at themselves and be honest, then any subsequent actions or possible solutions to snuff out a side of football that is creeping back up on us again, from over the not too distant horizon, will only be reactive, after the horse has already bolted stuff, when we all really need to be proactive instead.
Football can never be sanitised (nor should it ever be), so that opposition supporters are completely cuddly with each other, indulging in some sickly kind of over the top love in, but there are boundaries, that we as supporters (and certain players) must respect. Because if people keep giving the law enforcers so much ammunition to use against us all, they have the powers, wherewithal and and probably even the inclination to crack down on each and every one of us, as and when they see fit... and they will.
Jesus wept... I've gotten old and morphed into Victor Meldrew these days.

Anyway, Sunday was Sunday, tonight is Wednesday, and I'm at St. Andrew's to watch Blues against Millwall in a Championship fixture, on a night when the host club have taken into account that watching football is a bloody expensive hobby, that prices a lot of people out, so they decided last month, to slash the admission price to £10 for this game (that's less than certain Evo-Stik League teams are charging, six divisions below the Championship)... and £15 when title chasing Sheffield United roll up here in a few weeks time.
The 'Lions' arrived at St. Andrew's having lost four Championship games in a row, following their narrow victory at Derby County last month... and with the small matter of a FA Cup Quarter Final tie against Premier League club Brighton & Hove Albion to look forward to at the New Den on Sunday afternoon.

Though that was obviously the last thing they had on their minds tonight, because they were certainly focused on, and up for, this game. And Neil Harris' tactic of playing an extra central defender to quell Birmingham's front two, while they implemented a strategy of swift counter attacking, worked very well against a tired looking home side.
Blues had already lost both of their previous games so far this month, without having scored in either of them, but I don't think that many of the St. Andrew's faithful who turned out tonight, were expecting to witness a third defeat in a row, sans finding the net.
Garry Monk's side travel to Preston North End on Saturday, who beat Middlesbrough away from home tonight, to clock up their eleventh consecutive unbeaten game as they moved up to ninth in the table... beware the ides of March!

Blues had beaten Millwall 0-2 in the reverse fixture, back in November, but the Lions had won on their previous two visits to St. Andrew's, scoring the only goal of the game on both occasions.
Millwall for their part, needed all three points, to save themselves from being dragged into the automatic relegation places, especially as Rotherham United picked up three points on their travels at Queens Park Rangers tonight.

Birmingham, who began the game with four changes from Sunday's line up, made an inauspicious start to the game, with Issac Vassell being shown a yellow card for simulation when in took a tumble in the visitors area in the fourth minute.

In the thirteenth minute, Connor Mahoney played a sideways free kick out wide to Wes Harding on the right, who launched a long diagonal ball beyond the back post, in the tried and tested manner that has served Blues so well all season, but Millwall mopped up the danger and broke forward quickly, moving from box to box with lightning pace and netting the first goal of the night, as Lee Gregory nudged the ball forward to Ben Thompson, who slotted it under the body of the advancing (and woefully exposed) Lee Camp.
Ben Marshall almost doubled Millwall's range with a long range strike, after latching onto a stray pass from Gary Gardner, before Thompson netted again, cutting into the left hand side of the area having been released by Gregory again and before drilling in a shot across the goal and into the bottom right hand corner, while the home defence seemed to be caught in two minds and expecting Thompson to play a return pass to Gregory.

Blues left the pitch at half time to a muted chorus of booing, and their hopes of staging a comeback after the interval were thwarted, when Mahoney had a goal chalked off because of an offside flag.

In the main, Millwall restricted their hosts to long range efforts, although two of them, by half time substitute Craig Gardner weren't far off target, as he tried to make a dent in the arrears with a shoot on sight policy. 

Lukas Jutkiewicz and Jacques Maghoma, both entered the fray on the hour, in an attempt to ignite a spark in Blues attack... and although the former went close twice, Millwall weren't in the mood to let Birmingham back into the game now.. and they closed ranks to hold on doggedly, but also quite comfortably to their hard won spoils... and finished the night victorious. While a section of the home crowd who'd toughed it out until the end (quite a few people had left by then), voiced their disdain in time honoured fashioned

Birmingham City 0 v Millwall 2
Click HERE to peruse the current 'in a constant state of flux' Championship table details.