Birmingham City 2 v Barnsley 0 - EFL Championship

Tuesday 20th August 2019

SkyBet EFL Championship
at St. Andrew's Stadium

Birmingham City (0) 2
Lukas Jutkiewicz 69, Alvaro Gimenez 77

Barnsley (0) 0

Attendance: 20,061 (inc. 1,276 Barnsley fans)

Birmingham City:
Camp, Harding, Pedersen, Roberts, Jutkiewicz (Bailey, 90), Dean, Villalba (G Gardner, 74), Gimenez (Montero, 79), Davis, Sunjic, Seddon.
Unused subs - Stockdale, Crowley, C Gardner, Medina.
Barnsley
Radlinger, Williams, Diaby, Andersen, McGeehan, Bahre (Wilks, 72), Chaplin, Thomas (Halme, 83), Sibbick, Thiam (Schmidt, ,72), Mowatt.
Unused subs - Collins, Green, Styles, Pinillos.

"Birmingham had nothing to offer at all in midfield. They were abysmal... as bad as it gets. But hey! That's their problem", so speaketh a former Nottingham Forest and Aston Villa (amongst others) player, in his scathing post-match analysis, following Blues off-day at the City Ground on Saturday, on the completely unbiased (cough) BBC Radio Nottingham Sport, that I listened to as I was heading towards home through the city centre traffic.

As the inquest continued, amidst the brickbats against Pep Clotet's side, who had just lost for the first time in their last ten Championship games, talk of Blues struggling at the foot of the table this season and having no quality, or players who could put it in for ninety minutes, continued unabashed, while lavish superlative praised was lavished on the victorious home side, who, by virtue of their 3-0 win, were now level on points with 'struggling' Birmingham City in the table.

Let's face facts: Forest played very well on Saturday and Blues, err... didn't!

Sabri Lamouchi's side deserved to win. And the damage could've been even a lot worse if they weren't so lackadaisical in front of Lee Camp's goal on the day.

But, it was one poor performance by Birmingham, who'd emerged from their first two games of the season with a creditable four points, while fielding a team including a number of new signings, who'd arrived late in the day and are still blending in with a side that is going through a transitional phase, and would've benefited from having those players available during pre-season, as opposed to chucking them straight in at the deep end. But they'll learn to swim (and they'll have to, quite quickly), once they've found their bearings.

But the ex-pro, from his not entirely unbiased viewpoint, was prepared to write off a whole season for the West Midlands club, on the strength of a solitary disjointed performance.

Well, Steve Hodge, if that is the applied logic upon which you feel it is fair to make such judgements, generalisations and sweeping comments, maybe it is time to overlook all of your successful career achievements in the game and write you off as the mere spectator, who looked on, watching Diego Maradona disappear into the distance in Mexico City, when you didn't put a tackle in (or even trip him up) and offered no kind of resistance whatsoever in midfield, before he jinked his way towards Peter Shilton's goal to wreak havoc and ultimately score his second of the game... shortly after your sliced clearance had set the diminutive cheat up with the opportunity for his 'Hand of God' moment of infamy. Just saying.

But hey! That would be a churlish, unfair and knee-jerk reaction, based on evidence collected at one solitary game, so let's not even go there, eh!?

Blues had a shocker of an afternoon on Saturday... and once Forest had seized the initiative and momentum, they weren't about to give it back.
But a (fairly big) step back, deep breath and look at the bigger picture is required methinks.

Birmingham and Barnsley, both started tonight's game on four points apiece, the same total that Nottingham Forest have before they travel to the Valley to face Charlton Athletic tomorrow night. That's three points behind five teams at the top of the table and three points above the four sides at the bottom... and even though it's way too early to read anything into Championship positions, such a close run state of flux is the nature of the beast in this enthralling division.

For the record, their isn't a single team out of the whole twenty four in this league, that have either won, or lost, all of their opening games.
Tonight's sub-heading could have been 'patience is a virtue', because, in essence the game hadn't been very lively, or entertaining, for the first hour or so, with the two sides, looking to all intents and purposes as if they were destined to have to settle for a point apiece, from a lacklustre goalless draw.
A fairly pedestrian first half, almost sprang into life towards the interval, when Samuel Radlinger had to tip Fran Villalba's stinging shot over the bar, but besides that, there wasn't really very much to report prior to the break.
But, when Blues finally did start to turn the screw on their Yorkshire visitors, they resembled an invasion of shock troops, getting in behind enemy lines and inflicting maximum damage on the Tykes, until then seldom threatened, rearguard.

A comedy of errors, ricochets and rebounds in the Barnsley defence, almost gifted Jutkiewicz with a chance to open the scoring inside the final half a hour of the game, but Radlinger just about regained his composure enough to thwart the Blues striker as his shaky defence scrambled the ball away at the expense of a corner.

Álvaro Giménez and Villalba battled for possession on the edge of the visitors area, and when the latter played the ball out wide to Harding, Blues number two put in a well weighted ball towards Jutkiewicz who rose like a salmon to power a header past Radlinger, to give the home side the lead.

Eight minutes later, Steve Seddon, roaming with menace just inside the Barnsley half, advanced forward, before lobbing a measured diagonal ball into the path of Giménez, who took it down on his chest, before calmly looping the ball over the advancing Radlinger.

Barnsley had no answer to Blues increased tempo... and to add to their misery, on loan winger, Jefferson Montero, joined the fray from the bench for the final ten minutes and proved to be a real handful for the visitors on the left flank. One cross in particular caused a massed scramble in the Tykes six yard box, but the visitors managed to clear their lines.
In a nutshell... good things come to those who wait... and it was a patient, yet comfortable win for Blues in the end, with the new players catching the eye, while the old guard weighed in with some solid performances too.
I wonder if Steve Hodge was watching that second half?
FT: Birmingham City 2 v Barnsley 0

Barnsley now face Luton Town at Oakwell on Saturday, while Blues travel to South Wales for a noon kick off at Swansea City, on Sunday.

Me? I'll be out of the country too, treating the missus to a romantic weekend in Paris... AKA watching Paris Saint Germain v Toulouse in the French Ligue 1.

Massive kudos to all supporters who took part in the applause in memory of Rich Burgess in the 50th minute of tonight's game, and the heartfelt rendition of "Keep Right On"... stirring stuff.