Eustace praise as side dig deep to earn draw
JOHN Eustace admitted his team missed Krystian Bielik and Harlee Dean but praised his squad for digging deep to snatch a point against Swansea City on Tuesday night.
The Birmingham City boss had to make three changes to the team which won at Stoke, with Bielik suspended and Dean injured – which forced him to reshuffle both his defence and his midfield.
The loss of the experienced pair seemed to cost Blues as they started well but lost their shape as the Swans reeled off two goals in a quarter of an hour to lead at the break.
Blues recovered after the restart and grabbed a 2-2 draw thanks to Troy Deeney’s late goal.
“I am delighted with the effort of the group,” Eustace said. “I thought we deserved a point at least out of the game; the character the boys showed was a different class.
“Swansea are an excellent team. For 20 minutes we were really good, then we lost a bit of discipline and shape. If you do that against a top team like Swansea they will punish you.
“The first goal was really bad defending from us, allowing them to get in behind us. Then we lost our discipline in our shape for ten minutes, our pressing was as individuals and not as a collective, which is unlike us – and they will punish you. They scored an excellent goal before half time.
“We regrouped at half time, got together, put a few things right and I thought second half we were much better. We started the second half really well and I thought we deserved the goal in the end.
“I think every team is going to miss their top players. I have said before I think Krystian is the best midfielder in the Championship so you are going to miss him. Of course, you are going to miss Harlee Dean as well.
“So credit to the group of players in there. We brought Jordy in, who played right wing back. He played left wing back on Saturday and Max played centre half and Bacuna played that controlling midfielder.
“We had to move a lot of players out of their positions. Full credit to the group; it just shows whoever steps in is 100% committed and I was very proud of them.
“You have just got to keep going as long as you can. Did I think we would run out of time? No. We play to the end, it’s a 95-minute game. The substitutes that came on again were brilliant. We changed a couple of things and I have said from day one it’s about the squad.
“We started the game with two or three players who haven’t been playing and then to finish with the players who came on we changed our style a little bit and got our rewards.”