Defender delighted to finally make Marc with Blues!
MARC Roberts believes he is finally becoming the player he ‘should have been at the start’ of his Birmingham City career.
The defender is expected to start his ninth successive Championship game at Derby on Saturday – one short of his best-ever unbroken run in the league with Blues.
He does so in his third season at the club and after two campaigns in which he has struggled to justify the £3 million fee Harry Redknapp sent to Barnsley in the summer of 2017.
Part of that has been the revolving door on the manager’s office; Roberts is under his fifth boss in little more than two years – while another part was the Michael Morrison-Harlee Dean duopoly that saw Blues through last season.
But with Morrison gone, the former Halifax centre-half is flourishing and, asked if he felt he is in his best spell with Blues, the 29-year-old was unequivocal.
“Yes, 100 per cent,” he said. “I had a bad start coming in to the club when there was not much stability, a lot of change and changing ideas, ways of playing, not much structure from my point of view – not from anybody else’s point of view.
“Garry (Monk) came in, I really liked the way the club started changing.
“I was a bit unlucky because Morro and Harlee last year were very good and I had no complaints about that. The only chance I had to come in and play I got injured.
“I know the sort of player I am, I know what I have got, it’s just a shame it’s taken a while to get a constant run in the team and be in a structured environment.
“I think that’s a big difference, I think that’s a big difference for everybody when you see how far we have come since when I first joined to now.
“The structure in the club, the team and in the background is all changed and it’s a lot better. Everybody knows their job now and there was a clear identification there wasn’t before.’’
Indeed, Roberts admits he wondered if it would ever happen for him at St Andrew’s – and attributes the fact he is now showing what he can do to the faith invested in him by caretaker head coach Pep Clotet.
“Last year was really frustrating and I was like, ‘If this carries on .... ’ I am one of those types that wants to play.
“I was always pushing to play but I also respected the people in the squad who were doing well and I never expected to play in front of them while they were doing well.
“It was one of them, you are teammates and you want them to do well. It’s fortunate this year I have had the chance to come in.
“Pep has given me the confidence, he says he has confidence in me and wants me to play.
“I think you can see I have responded and it makes a big difference to me personally knowing you have got someone behind you that has got a bit of trust in you. I think you can see the sort of player I am, what I should have been at the start.
“Like I said before, the structure and the organisation from the people behind the scenes makes a big difference on the pitch.”
Meanwhile, Josh McEachran’s fitness is improving after a full 90 minutes for Blues’ Under-23s.
That’s the view of development coach Steve Spooner, who gave the free agent a full game as Blues drew 1-1 with Sheffield United at St Andrew’s on Monday.
McEachran is in his third week on trial and is hopeful of earning a deal to stay at St Andrew’s at least until the end of the season.
Clotet has been tight-lipped with his view of a potential signing, citing a need for the 26-year-old’s conditioning to improve. In that regard at least, McEachran seems to be moving in the right direction.
“Physically he is getting stronger,” said Spooner. “That’s his third game on the trot, he’s lasting longer in games, though by his own admission he felt really tired towards the end.
“He’s an excellent footballer with the ball, he takes it, sees passes and he has it under pressure, he can play one-two touch and has a varied range of passing.
“It’s good for someone like Ryan Stirk to play with someone like that – and he’s not too dissimilar to him.
“Josh had a very promising career early on, I don’t know the full story but he is a good player and when you look at Ryan Stirk it’s good for us to do a comparison with an excellent player coming into the club.
“That gives you a guideline to how far your boys are behind or how near they are to them and I would say with a lot of them they are near to him.”