It had been an eventful morning. Th central heating boiler had packed up the day before and having waited 24 hours the boiler engineer appeared to tell me that the problem was electrical (I had worked that out for myself!) Fortunately, I know a great sparky who in contrast to the boiler company appeared within 15 minutes and had fixed the problem within an hour. I had hoped that Will could join me for the long trip to Birmingham and as of Friday he had intimated that he was going but his brother Chris called and said he was not able to make it and I hadn’t been able to contact Will to find out why so off I went to the train station. Engineering works around Reading meant a longer journey time than usual. I saw a number of Royals fans as I passed through who had looks of people on death row presumably because of their parlous position in the Premier League and it made me reflect that in a way I’m glad we are no where near promotion this year as in a Championship that is distinctly below average the chances of any team going up this year next season are remote.
I got to Coventry after a change at Oxford at about 13.20 to be picked up by Chris and Little Jack. We got to the Royal George in plenty of time to neck a couple of pints before getting into the ground. My overriding thought was ‘please God let us win today.’ It has been a pretty dire season results wise especially at home and in fact our record to date showed us marginally better away from St Andrews. Losing to a poor Wolves team last time out due to profligacy at both ends of the pitch was hard to take and memories of how we gifted our present opponents, Millwall a three goals start in a crazy eleven minutes spell earlier in the season at their place came flooding back. Whilst we salvaged a point with a storming fight back that night we have failed to overturn such deficits against Hull and Wolves so I desperately hoped it would not be another one of those days.
Well at least it wasn’t but it wasn’t a good match. This was a soulless encounter between two poor teams. The first half meandered along with little to excite the heart or stir the blood. Both teams seemed ponderous; Blues because they were nervous about getting unnecessarily blitzed like they did against Wolves and Millwall I suspect because their players have one eye on their forthcoming trip to Wembley in the semi-final of the FA Cup. Although mid table neither side is totally safe from getting sucked into the relegation dog fight and a drab 1-1 result was somehow predictable. Blues started with Butland in goal, Caddis, Davies, Robinson and Hancox across the back. The midfield four comprised of Redmond, Elliott, Spector and Morisson with Zigic and Thomas up top. As so often this season, Blues never really sparked but Millwall had their goalkeeper, David Forde to thank for a first class save from Wes Thomas’ volley after an excellent flowing move after only four minutes but these moments were too fleeting and frankly Blues were overpowered by the more powerful and physical Millwall team who towards the end could and should have won this game.
The most noteworthy incident in the first period cam when a cross from the right which was almost a carbon copy of the one that Ebanks-Blake converted for Wolves on Monday was side-footed unchallenged at the far post by Chris Taylor across Butland into the far corner. The Assistant’s flag went up for offside against Chaplow who was credited with the goal over the loudspeakers. Keith Hill the referee went across to speak to the assistant and appeared to reverse the decision and give the goal. The protests now changed from the visitors to the home side. Butland threw the ball towards the centre circle resigned to the award of the goal but Paul Robinson told Butland to take the ball back into his box for a free kick whilst the argument continued to rage. Incredibly, the referee changed his mind again, we think because the fourth official got involved and reversed the decision again. Whilst I think they got it right in the end, Kenny Jackett will be furious with Chaplow as the shot from Taylor was goal bound anyway. This was a very lucky escape from Blues’ standpoint but to be fair they wouldn’t have deserved to be behind at that juncture.
Blues started brightly in the second half and deservedly took the lead on 49 minutes after Forde had been called upon to make another fantastic save from Morrison. However, he was powerless to stop Wes Thomas from scoring after a good ball into his feet and a cute turn and shot into the bottom corner. The relief was tangible but the nerves returned as Blues retreated into their shell and tried to sit on the lead. Millwall were winning all the midfield battles especially in the air where their greater collective height was beginning to take its toll. Birmingham were sitting far too deep and inevitably a mistake in midfield led to a good move and a cross from the left from Hulse to the unmarked Taylor who made no mistake from fifteen yards for a thoroughly deserved equaliser. Yet another example of poor defending due to failure to track the spare man. Blues clung on for their point which I feel we have to be grateful for. It could have been worse and we had to rely on our young goalkeeper to save Sean St Ledger’s fierce header against the bar towards the end. It was a poor match but over the piece Millwall had the better of it. True, Forde kept them in the game and had either of the two truly top saves that he made had got past him, I suspect Blues would have gone on to claim all three points but they didn’t really deserve more than they got.
Spector went down injured in the second half with ankle ligament damage and Zigic had to go off late in the game for an assault of a challenge from Shittu who infringed repeatedly all afternoon because he was allowed to get away with it by Mr Hill who gave one of the most inept, disjointed and frankly baffling performances I have seen all season. This official was absolutely dreadful and he booked Reilly for his first real challenge having come on for Spector when he clearly played the ball cleanly and yet allowed Shittu to bury his forearm into the back of Zigic’s neck every time the big man tried to head the ball. Far too many fouls from muscular challenges went unpunished and a tackle from behind on Caddis that was waved away when he had cut inside to find an excellent position just outside the box was a disgrace.
It is now only 6 wins in 21 home games and that is why we find ourselves in mid table mediocrity. We are limping towards then end of the campaign and soon this torment will be at an end. For me it can’t come soon enough.
The Good: we didn’t lose; we could not have complained if we had done; they were the better side certainly in the second half.
The Bad: the referee; absolutely terrible performance.
The Ugly: the agricultural defending from Shittu. How he wasn’t booked is beyond me.
Birmingham City: Jack Butland 6 Paul Caddis 6 Curtis Davies 6 Paul Robinson 6 Mitch Hancox 5 Nathan Redmond 6 Wade Elliott 5 (Koby Arthur 78, N/A) Jonathan Spector 5 (Callum Reilly 45, 5) Ravel Morrison 6 Nikola Zigic 5 (Peter Lovenkrands 90, N/A) Wes Thomas 6
Goal: Thomas 49 min
Bookings: Spector Reilly Zigic Elliott
Millwall: David Forde 8 Alan Dunne 6 Danny Shittu 6 Liam Trotter 6 Sean St Ledger 6 Liam Feeney 6 (Jermaine Easter 59, 6) Mark Beevers 6 Shane Lowry 6 Richard Chaplow 6 (Martyn Woolford, 57, 6) Rob Hulse 7 Chris Taylor 7
Goal: Taylor 71 min
Booking: Taylor
Referee: Keith Hill 3 (some would say this score is generous)
A dreadful game played by two teams, who did not possess one skilful footballer between them. Both teams should have been deducted one point each and the fans should have got their money back. The Blues team had obviously had a bet on Taylor scoring for Millwall,because not one of them marked him throughout the whole game. Blues fullbacks,allowed Millwall to cross the ball as often as they liked and the rest of the team,found passing and controlling the ball virtually impossible. It appeared that Clark had sent them out with no plan,no ideas and most of them were too thick to come up with any of there own. The game was a microcosm of the whole season,absolute rubbish ! It’s a good job we won’t make the play offs,because who ever goes up from this division this season,will get slaughtered in the premiership next season !
Poor game made even worse by yet another absolutely inept referee – how many times have we said that this season? Incredibly, according to Dan on OP http://www.oftenpartisan.co.uk/archives/8408/hokey-cokey-moment-millwall-reflections.html this ref:
“was on secondment in Japan training other refs how to do their jobs.”
I really feel for the Japanese football fans who have to endure the performances of his trainees!
Credit to you for the time and effort which you put into attending home games. Longing for the end of the season is understandable but don’t imagine that next season will be any better unless the present crew sell up and we gain an owner with integrity, if not great wealth. If they remain then relegation will be highly probable. If we finish in mid table then that will be the best which we could have reasonably hoped for when the season started. The squad is weaker than last season’s and you can bet that the coming closed season will see further departures in pursuance of reducing the owner’s crazy, self-inflicted losses through the barmy purchase sum. All those who support the club in the sense of it’s historical meaning to fans, rather than transient owners and even more short-term playing staff, should absent themselves next season. The sooner that the club is sold, the better. With no revenue from ticket sales and the final revenue from player sales this summer, the owners will be faced with the fact that they have sucked out all of the easily liquidated assets and the revenue cliff has been reached. That should bring them to a rapid sale. Not attending games will not weaken the prospects for the Club, they are already dire, it will hasten the time when we can assist the renovation.