Cotterill takes higher Grounds on full-back
STEVE Cotterill believes Blues have retained the services of ‘one of the most under-rated leftbacks in the Championship’.
The boss rewarded Jonathan Grounds with a new two-year contract last week and has tipped the defender to continue to catch the eye.
Grounds is into his fourth season at the club and has made 165 appearances since joining on a free transfer from Oldham.
Cotterill reckons the switch to a slightly more expansive style is benefitting the 29-year-old.
“I think Jonathan Grounds is one of the most under-rated left-backs in the Championship,” he said.
“The way Birmingham City have played over the last few years, because they’ve been a low block team that has played off the striker, I think Jonathan Grounds has played within himself in that low block.
“Now that we’re asking him to step out and attack, I think you’re perhaps seeing the Jonathan Grounds that was there a couple of years ago.
“So maybe the change in the way we’re playing has brought Jonathan more to people’s attention, but that’s credit to him, not to anyone else.”
Grounds was one of two Blues players to renew their commitment last week. Maikel Kieftenbeld also extended his stay at St Andrew’s as Cotterill secured the services of players he feels he can depend on.
“They are good lads, good players, reliable, play games, do the right things nearly all of the time and were worthy of new deals,” he said.
“They’ve both been good 7/10 performers for Birmingham over the last few years.
“I think there has been many a player brought in to replace them and these two lads have seen them off and for me they needed rewarding – and they have been.
“They’re committed to the club and the club has committed to them. They are valuable to the squad and valuable to the dressing room. They give a lot and they’re both really good boys.
“They are an integral cog of the football club and they’ve been here a long time now. If you have a lot more of those sorts of boys in and around it we wouldn’t have found ourselves where we are, that’s for sure.”
Arsenal defenders Carl Jenkinson and Cohen Bramall could remain at Birmingham for the rest of the season.
There has been speculation Blues want to end the loan deals that brought the full-backs to the club in last summer’s transfer window.
For that to happen both clubs and players would have to agree, although Blues manager Steve Cotterill has always been open-minded about the situation.
“They could end up being here for the rest of the season – that could happen,” he said. “I think what’s happened now is obviously Carl Jenkinson has had a fair bit more training, had an hour last Friday in a 23 game. What we need to do is try to avoid any of those long-standing injuries that have been a major problem. With Cohen, Cohen has done better in training probably in the last month or two than perhaps he would have done at the beginning of the season.
“So he has probably matured and stepped up a little bit more. But we have had a very, very consistent left-back – and we have had a consistent right-back in Max.
“That’s not to say we don’t keep them here for the rest of the season because we may well be doing that – because that does give us a little bit of balance.”
Jenkinson has played just once for Blues, an appearance which ended after just half-an-hour when he dislocated his shoulder.
Bramall has also been a bit-part player and last featured in the defeat at Fulham in December.