For a few minutes it looked like Birmingham City’s game against Blackburn Rovers last Saturday was going to be a mirror image of the game against Ipswich Town in Week 1. Blackburn scored first in the 50th minute, then Jay Stansfield converted a penalty just into second-half stoppage time. But then substitute Lyndon Dykes tapped it in on a breakaway with time expiring to take the 2-1 win, the Blues’ first league win of the season. It was generally another dominating display, Birmingham having 60% possession and outshooting Rovers 8-5 overall and 4-2 on target.
This week the team is back home to face Oxford United (9:00am, no US TV). Oxford has lost both league games so far (0-1 to Portsmouth and 2-3 to Hull City) and scraped by League Two’s Colchester United 1-0. Oxford also finished 17th last season. Form so far then suggests a Blues win and the betting odds are favoring that result as well. But it remains early in the season so who can really say. Oxford manager Gary Rowett will be up for this one: he played for the Blues for 3 years and was manager twice, most recently on an interim basis at the end of the 2023-24 relegation season (and almost kept the team from the drop).
The European transfer remains open until September 1st, and City are still active in searching for new players. Rumors have them looking to make a deal for Mikayil Faye, a left back currently at Rennes and once with Barcelona. If they close the transaction it would the 3rd deal with Rennes in just over a year: they sold Jordan James to the French club last summer and just bought Kyogo Furuhashi from them this offseason. The club had been looking to get Ben Davies from Glasgow Rangers after his loan last year, but they could not come to terms and in fact he will be signing with Oxford, although it is unclear whether he will be available for tomorrow’s match.
There are also indications that the Blues are working on a free transfer for Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain. The attacking midfielder is at Turkish side Besiktas right now but is a former England international with time at Arsenal and Liverpool. They are also pursuing a loan deal for forward Lewis Koumas from Liverpool. The highly-rated 19-year-old is being courted by at least 6 teams. The Blues are apparently leading the pack, although Wrexham is also making an aggressive push (Koumas, although born in England, is a Welsh international). Earlier today respected Italian sportswriter Fabrizio Romano reported on X that the Blues had won the chase but this has not yet been confirmed.
