As bad as things have been on this side of the pond, they haven’t been much better over there. Birmingham City has now lost three straight games without scoring, most recently 0-1 at Stoke City. In that last game they failed to record a single shot on target and are currently 11th in the Championship.
The tough opening schedule may get a little easier tomorrow. For a start, the Blues are back home after 2 games on the road. They face Swansea City (6:30am, Paramount+). Swansa are 7th at the moment but that’s potentially deceiving as they have had a relatively light schedule so far. Notably, they have played both Sheffield teams, who, in a lamentable situation for that city, occupy the bottom 2 spots in the table. They have lost just 1 game: the season opener, 0-1 to Middlesbrough, who are top of the table with an unbeaten record. Their other 2 games were both draws, with Watford and Hull City (17th and 20th respectively).
The Swans’ best result came just this past Wednesday when they beat Premier League team Nottingham Forest 3-2 in the EFL Cup thanks to 2 stoppage-time goals. However, their manager Alan Sheehan is complaining because tomorrow’s game has an early kickoff (12:30pm UK time, well ahead of the traditional 3:00pm) thanks to Sky Sports’ scheduling. That’s a gap of just 60 hours. Them’s the breaks, I guess.
Blues gaffer Chris Davies has a history with Swansea. Although born just north of London he is Welsh and his first coaching job was as an assistant to Brendan Rogers at the Swans at the grand old age of 25. He helped get them to the Premier League in 2011 and was the manager position for the team’s reserve squad but chose to follow Rogers to Liverpool instead. Swansea reached out to him twice a little over a year ago to take the first-team job, but he stuck with the assistant position at Tottenham Hotspur and eventually chose to accept Birmingham’s offer.
No news on the transfer front this week. However, the club is working on a long-term plan to fend off poaching attempts from several Premier League teams for the services of Alfie Smith. Smith is a goalkeeper and considered a prodigy and potentially the next big thing for England at that position. He is a mountainous 6’11” tall despite being just 14 years old. He has already played for the Blues youth teams on a regular basis. Just last week he set the record for the youngest keeper ever in the U18 Premier League in a 4-3 win over Fulham, including setting up the opening goal just 20 seconds into the match. He’s also on the England U16 roster (but has yet to play). Currently, Chelsea, Liverpool, Arsenal and both Manchester teams are all looking to sign him to a full pro contract. That can’t happen for a few years yet, of course, but Birmingham is not sitting idle.
