FA Cup Fourth Round
at St. Andrew's Stadium
Coventry City (0) 0
Birmingham City (0) 0
Attendance: 21,193 (inc. 9,465 'away' fans)
Coventry City:
Marosi, Hyam, McFadzean, Rose, Dabo, Walsh, Kelly, McCallum; Shipley (O’Hare 68), Westbrooke (Biamou 68), Godden (Bakayoko 81).
Unused subs - Mason, Allen, Pask, Wilson (GK).
Birmingham City:
Camp, Colin, Dean, Clarke-Salter, Pedersen, McEachran, Sunjic, Montero (Maghoma 85), Mrabti (Bela 56), Bellingham (G Gardner 85), Jutkiewicz.
Unused subs - Roberts, Davis, Gimenez, Ramos (GK).
Marosi, Hyam, McFadzean, Rose, Dabo, Walsh, Kelly, McCallum; Shipley (O’Hare 68), Westbrooke (Biamou 68), Godden (Bakayoko 81).
Unused subs - Mason, Allen, Pask, Wilson (GK).
Birmingham City:
Camp, Colin, Dean, Clarke-Salter, Pedersen, McEachran, Sunjic, Montero (Maghoma 85), Mrabti (Bela 56), Bellingham (G Gardner 85), Jutkiewicz.
Unused subs - Roberts, Davis, Gimenez, Ramos (GK).
In the previous round, Pep Clotet's side had beaten Blackburn Rovers 2-1, in front of a crowd of 7,330, which included 843 visiting supporters (i.e 6,487 Blues fans), while Coventry beat Bristol Rovers at St. Andrew's 3-0, in a third round replay, that attracted a crowd of 2,693 of which 397 were Pirates fans (meaning that only 2,296 Sky Blues fans were present on the night). Mark Robins' side drew their initial tie at the Pirates' Memorial Ground 2-2, having drawn had to come from going behind twice.
The FA Cup draw, pairing 'Cov' and Blues, was almost inevitably going to happen at some point, from the moment that the Sky Blues signed up for a ground sharing deal at St. Andrew's... and when it did, it was almost bound to be a draw, necessitating a replay at the same ground.
On Tuesday morning, the Birmingham City club website posted a message saying that today's 'visitors' had sold all of their entire 9,260 ticket allocation. And that was followed shortly afterwards, by a similar announcement from Coventry City, saying that they had shifted just over 10,000 briefs and there were no more available.
The official stadium capacity is still, I am led to believe: 29,409, but after consultations between both clubs and the West Midlands Police, areas of seats were left unsold for segregation purposes. While the crowd limit (including hospitality packages) was capped at 22,000.
Two blocks of seats that are usually open for visiting supporters to use, in the Gil Merrick Stand/Railway End, remained empty, because the turnstiles through which those areas are accessed, are in the away fans car park... which this afternoon, is where the coaches ferrying the 'home' fans from Coventry into Birmingham were being parked.
In the event, there were 205 more Blues fans than that reported 'sold out' figure in the sections of the ground allocated to them, which possibly explains how the problem arose with overcrowding on the aisles and in the stairwells throughout the afternoon.
Common sense would suggest that it might've been wise to make use of some of the static areas for the subsequent over-spill, to alleviate the apparent and fairly obvious congestion.
Understandably, there are a number of disgruntled supporters in both camps, who were disappointed to have missed out on tickets for today's game... and, financially speaking, making more seats available would've meant more income for both cash-strapped clubs, seeing as the gate money for FA Cup games is split 50/50 after the FA have creamed 10% off of the total gate receipts figure..
But... as a combined total of just 8,783 'home' fans had turned out for the two third round ties at St. Andrew's, the authorities had all the statistical date and evidence that they needed to impose a restriction on today's gate.
Not that they ever need any kind of excuse to inconvenience football supporters around these parts.
Alas, they could also back up those figures, secure in the knowledge that 'the greatest cup competition in the world', no longer holds the same kind of sway and box office appeal that it once did, back in the days when priorities within the game were much different.
A large percentage of modern day fans, no longer have the inclination to huddle around Bakelite radio sets at 12.30PM on a Monday, in excited anticipation, listening to the draw for the next round of t'cup being made live. In fact a large number of them (but not all of them, in their entirety), probably give the draw no more than a mere cursory glance on their mobile devices, before heading back onto social media, to slag off the team that they purport to support's players and their fellow supporters.
Sad but true, The FA Cup is seen many as an irrelevance and irritant, clogging up the flow of league games in an even more annoying fashion than the regular, and usually very untimely, international breaks.
The game itself, as a spectacle, was fairly awful. So much so, that I hereby applaud the BBC for having managed to pick a whole two minutes and twenty one seconds of highlights (including action replays) to show on their website (click HERE) out of this dreary stalemate... and must also thank Callum O'Hare, who is on-loan at the Sky Blues from Aston Villa, for providing a moment of sheer comedy to lighten the mood of the afternoon, in second half stoppage time, when he missed an absolute sitter of a chance, after Armadou Bakayoko had headed down Liam Walsh's cross into the path of the former England Under 20 player.
On Tuesday morning, the Birmingham City club website posted a message saying that today's 'visitors' had sold all of their entire 9,260 ticket allocation. And that was followed shortly afterwards, by a similar announcement from Coventry City, saying that they had shifted just over 10,000 briefs and there were no more available.
Two blocks of seats that are usually open for visiting supporters to use, in the Gil Merrick Stand/Railway End, remained empty, because the turnstiles through which those areas are accessed, are in the away fans car park... which this afternoon, is where the coaches ferrying the 'home' fans from Coventry into Birmingham were being parked.
Common sense would suggest that it might've been wise to make use of some of the static areas for the subsequent over-spill, to alleviate the apparent and fairly obvious congestion.
But... as a combined total of just 8,783 'home' fans had turned out for the two third round ties at St. Andrew's, the authorities had all the statistical date and evidence that they needed to impose a restriction on today's gate.
Not that they ever need any kind of excuse to inconvenience football supporters around these parts.
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| Good afternoon Mr Stokes |
A large percentage of modern day fans, no longer have the inclination to huddle around Bakelite radio sets at 12.30PM on a Monday, in excited anticipation, listening to the draw for the next round of t'cup being made live. In fact a large number of them (but not all of them, in their entirety), probably give the draw no more than a mere cursory glance on their mobile devices, before heading back onto social media, to slag off the team that they purport to support's players and their fellow supporters.
The game itself, as a spectacle, was fairly awful. So much so, that I hereby applaud the BBC for having managed to pick a whole two minutes and twenty one seconds of highlights (including action replays) to show on their website (click HERE) out of this dreary stalemate... and must also thank Callum O'Hare, who is on-loan at the Sky Blues from Aston Villa, for providing a moment of sheer comedy to lighten the mood of the afternoon, in second half stoppage time, when he missed an absolute sitter of a chance, after Armadou Bakayoko had headed down Liam Walsh's cross into the path of the former England Under 20 player.
 |
| Look! What you get up to in your own home is your business. But while you're stopping here, we need some ground rules |
Pep Clotet was glowing about how well his side had approached this game tactically, but I'm not sure that he would be able to find a single Blues fan that would respond to that claim very enthusiastically.
Blues managed two shots on target, out of an overall total of five chances, across the entire ninety plus minutes, which was exactly the same amount as Coventry,
Fankaty Dabo was instrumental in keeping Blues at bay, looking very composed and strong in the tackle, while both goalkeepers, who had remained untroubled for most of the game, made a decent stop apiece to claim a clean sheet each.
Marko Marosi thwarted Jefferson Montero's close range volley, early in the second half as he turned the ball against the bar, while Lee Camp turned away Max Biamou's snap shot late in the second half.
But in the main, the game didn't live up to any of the hype associated with it in the build up.
In fact, if the Blues merchandising department decide to release a DVD of this game, they could be onto a winner, as insomniacs the world over would be queuing around the ground to get their hands on a copy for what would be a surefire cure for their sleep deprivation habits. I'm not so sure that the demand for replay tickets will be quite as high though.
FT: Coventry City 0 v Birmingham City 0
These two sides will now meet again at St. Andrew's on Tuesday 4th February, which will be the thirty-sixth first team game that they will have played at the ground this season so far.
During the interim, Blues have a home game against Nottingham Forest in the Championship to look forward to next weekend, while Coventry face back to back away games at Fleetwood Town and Bristol Rovers.
On Tuesday night, Birmingham had been robbed of three points at Middlesbrough, by a referee: Andy Woolmer, who was as bent as a nine bob note, while Boro's Marcus Tavernier earned himself a place on the shortlist for an Oscar and Johnathan Woodgate, the Teessiders manager, proved to be an unreliable eye-witness, who is incapable of giving an accurate and honest statement.
On the way back to the station, somebody told me that I could now officially tick Coventry City off on my grounds visited list.
This is the fourth different ground that I've seen 'Cov' play 'home' games at now... and I was already planning on counting St. Andrew's towards my overall total anyway, whether I actually saw the Sky Blues play here or not.
Three young lads were bouncing around under the railway bridge on Coventry Road, singing "Sky blue army!"... "Just you wait 'til we get you back to our place!", boomed a Blues fan in response.
A glass half-full optimist, could point out that Blues have chalked up yet another unbeaten game , towards a run that now extends to five matches... and they're still in the hat for Monday night's FA Cup fifth round draw too. I'm more of a pragmatic realist myself... and while conceding that things could be worse (no, really) for Blues, they could definitely get a whole lot better too, and there is no glossing over the fact that today's disappointing game was the kind of stalemate that has gotten nil-nil draws a bad name.
I wonder if the 'Cov' fans who're boycotting their home games outside of Coventry, but still attending away games, will travel across for the replay.
