Blues have chosen a very good season for transition
ANIGHTMARE hour at St Andrew’s saw Birmingham City sustain injuries in the warmup before and during the first half of their 2-0 loss to Huddersfield on Saturday.
Goals from Levi Colwill, via a deflection off Gary Gardner, and Lewis O’Brien gave the visitors a relatively straightforward victory and left Blues and head coach Lee Bowyer needing to find answers.
Their performances in terms of how they use the ball are more engaging than before Christmas but their form is poor and they are running out of players.
Here’s what stood out from a troubling afternoon at St Andrew’s.
Well planned
Huddersfield knew exactly how they were going to attack Blues.
Carlos Corberan’s team are normally a possession-based, passing side, yet at St Andrew’s they changed both formation and style.
The 3-4-3 which had seen them produce a last-gasp victory against Cardiff just three days prior, became a 4-3-3 and the mobile striker, Danny Ward, was replaced by target man Jordan Rhodes.
Instead of trying to play through Blues, Huddersfield knew they could pressurise their non-defensive defenders by chipping balls in behind and pressing hard.
Both Corberan and O’Brien spoke about it after the game, how they knew they could force mistakes from players playing out of position.
O’Brien’s goal was an absolute case in point, with a pass going over Gardner’s head, Kristian Pedersen coming across to cover without actually doing anything, then, as a central midfielder, Gardner’s instinct to try to keep the ball alive kicked in when he should have clattered it into the Main Stand.
After that, needing to chase the game, Blues went forward and were caught on the counter again and again in a first half which could have ended 3-0 or 4-0.
It all felt a bit predictable as Town superbly executed their plan against a hapless defence.
Tightrope
Another match, another injury – or two to be precise.
Just when it looked like help was on its way, with Tahith Chong and Taylor Richards appearing on the bench, Lyle Taylor pulled up in the warm-up and Maxime Colin sustained a thigh problem and was substituted with just a quarter of the game gone.
Blues now have just one recognised senior defender, Pedersen. And to introduce a further element of jeopardy, the Dane has nine yellow cards and must negotiate the next two matches, away to Bristol City and at home to Hull, if he is to avoid a two-match ban.
To be fair to Pedersen, once Huddersfield reined their attacking ambitions in during the second half he actually played quite well but he won’t have enjoyed being out-run by Rhodes in a one-on-one situation in the first half.
Bowyer will hope some of Teden Mengi, Marc Roberts and George Friend are available for the trip to Ashton Gate on Saturday otherwise he will have no choice but to turn to the likes of Tate Campbell, Nico Gordon and Marcel Oakley.
He has entrusted Jordan James to either sink or swim at Championship level, let’s find out more about one of his defensive youngsters who can’t enjoy seeing wingers and central midfielders playing in front of them.
n Progress
Blues are going to start March with no-one particularly worried about a relegation battle – that’s not been said very often in the last few seasons and has to be viewed as a positive.
However, that’s as much to do with the teams below them as what they have produced themselves.
Blues are 19th and have 37 points from 35 games, which is hardly barrelling along, indeed, it’s only two more than they managed at the same stage under Aitor Karanka and it was a humiliating defeat to Bristol City in their 36th match that did for the Spaniard.
Now, we are nowhere near that territory at present, Blues and Bowyer can afford to be seen to be in ‘transition’ as long as the teams below them are treading water.
But if you give Derby back their 21 points and Reading their six, deducted for FFP breaches, it all looks a bit familiar – Blues are only two points off the bottom three.
With Barnsley and Peterborough surely going down, Derby would be well out of trouble, Reading would be in the third relegation place with 35 points and a game in hand.
Blues have chosen a very good season to go through their transition – but it has to pay dividends in future campaigns otherwise this one is going to be viewed as just another year of struggle.