Note: AKA Admin Appreciation thread - show the Admins some love in the last match thread of 2012
This will be the 122nd meeting between the clubs, with the head to head record being 47 Wanderers wins, 32 draws and 42 Birmingham wins.
The most recent meeting was back in September, where Birmingham ran out 2-1 winners. You can view a match report here. http://www.burndenaces.co.uk/2012/09/18/birmingham-city-2-1-bolton-wanderers.html
The clubs haven't met at the Reebok since August 2010, when Wanderers came back from a 2-0 deficit, down to ten men when Jaaskelainen got himself sent off through sheer stupidity.
You can view the match day programme for free here:
http://publ.com/pa78tGu#/1/u
Form guides (most recent first)
Wanderers: LLWDLWDDDD
Birmingham: WDDLWDLLDW
Did you know?
One of the most pivotal inventions of the Industrial Revolution, the industrial steam engine, was invented in Birmingham, by James Watt and Matthew Boulton, in 1776.
House of Fraser on Corporation Street, Birmingham, is the largest department store in the UK outside London.
Birmingham was the birth place of heavy metal music, but has also given Duran Duran, Dexys Midnight Runners and ELO to the world.
Our predictions - the optomism worm has turned!!!
Wanderers win - 9
Romance in Durango, Vera, TheHateCamel, Wondering Wanderer, goldenwyndavies, bennythedip, OnlyOneFinFreedman, largehat, luckyPeterPiper
The Draw - 5
Petrov, Norpig, WhiteBic, ExiledinEssex, finlaymcdanger
Brummies win - 7
WanderersForever, royston-vasey, ZatKnight's 50p head, Contemplating Excel Frolics, GoldenGambler, GrashBWFC
Odds
Wanderers 10/11 The Draw 12/5 Brummies 3/1
RESULT
WANDERERS 3-1 BRUMMIES
Zigic 11'
Alonso 27'
Chung-Yong 33'
Andrews pen 77'
Teams - Kevin Davies is back from suspension. Mills, Holden, Vela, Wheater, M Davies long term injuries. Ngog, Andrews and Afobe all doubtful. Team virtually picks itself.
Wanderers
Bogdan, Mears, Knight, Ream, Alonso, Andrews, Spearing, Eagles, Pratley, Chung-Yong, K Davies
Subs - Lonergan, Ricketts, Petrov, Afobe, Sordell, Riley, Butterfield
Brummies
Butland, Caldwell, Davies, Burke, Mullins, Zigic, Spector, Hancox, Hall, Robinson, Reilly
Subs: Doyle, Ibanez, Elliott, Gordon, Jervis, Redmond, Delfouneso
Official BWFC live text updates
LIVE version of this thread
http://www.ja606.co.uk/articles/viewLiveArticle/177296
Please post any radio links and I will add them to the article here
Wanderers 3-1 Brummies LIVE match thread
posted on 29/12/12
Let's just hope its the end of the terrible 442 formation:
Bogdan: competent
Meats: better than v Sh W but still rubbish
Alonso: Did the business
Knight: Terrible (distribution & defending)
Ream: 2 good games in row promising
CYL: Best game since injury
Andrews & Spearin: solid, protected back 4
Eagles: usual poppinjay performance
Pratley: Best game in a Bolton shirt
Davies: led line like others can't.
posted on 29/12/12
Is it time for DF to give Bogdan a rest and use Lonergran? He has been tried and tested at this level.
Replacing Knight is more of a concern than Mears. Problem is Knight seems to be favoured over others.
Will DF let Andrews and Spearing build a partnership in the middle? Or is Andrews still not doing enough?
Will he look for a goal scorer or stick with Ngog and SKD?
Is Sordell our only saleable asset?
posted on 29/12/12
You have brought to my mind something that's been nagging away at me the last few days, Petrov.
Dougie has said, and I agree, that we need to sign players with experience at Championship football.
Looking at the players who have more than a handful of prior experience at this level, he doesn't play them when they are available half the time.... ie Butterfield and Sordell. When you also add in Mears, Eagles, Mills, Andrews and Lonergan, we've actually got half a team of players with that experience he feels we need. I expect he has specific targets in mind and this will be his rationale for dropping certain 'big names' in their stead.
posted on 29/12/12
Nice 3 points today and we needed them,although Birmingham were awful.
Hope we get some quality in during the window though,and I think the loan route is our best option.No point getting in second rate players,lets gamble on loans and see were we end up at the end of the season.
If rumours are true Chelsea owe us a loan and we should have taken Lukaku last season if its to be believed.Players like Powell,Guidetti Shay Given are phone calls I would be making this week to see if they are available to us.
As for DF not knocking the bloke but I just feel even if we were to progress this season or the next,he surely cant be our future.
posted on 29/12/12
As for DF not knocking the bloke but I just feel even if we were to progress this season or the next,he surely cant be our future.
------
Why not?
(evening by the way bud)
posted on 29/12/12
Evening LH
Just dont see it happening mate,maybe not even being his fault.
To go over old ground we should have made the managerial change last Oct when our stock was slightly higher in terms of bringing a quality coach in.I suggested Laudrup,Heirro etc ok that may have not happened but we had a chance then.
We are now stuck with a manager I believe nobody wanted and players who are not good enough.Just say we go on a run and nick a promotion through the play offs,DF will be a dead man walking then anyway.
I do believe we should have made a gamble on two years of considering our standing Mick McCarthy and then rebuilt from there.
Said before that relegation will/could take us back ten years.
posted on 30/12/12
I'd have had no issue with a Laudrup or an Hierro taking over because I believe that a club of our stature is best served by taking a chance on a younger candidate than a serial failure.
Who that younger candidate turns out to be, is obviously a key question, but I would say this: I'm much happier to be in the situation we're in now after a dozen or so games with a new man in charge who is a younger manager, still learning the game, with fresh ideas and impetus, than if we'd appointed a Mick McCarthy or a Steve Bruce and achieved similar results.
A younger manager gives me more optimism for the future because we simply can't predict how they will perform at that higher level if they get us there. I think to say if we somehow went up this season DF would be a 'dead man walking' is absolutely an utterly wrong.
How many young, unproven managers have led a club into the PL over the last three or four years and excelled?
Look at last season. Rodgers and Lambert swam; Neil Warnock, the journeyman manager, sunk.
Look at the season before, Hughton and Di Matteo did well and were unjustly sacked, Holloway, the journeyman manager, took Blackpool straight back down.
Of course, there are examples both ways. Coyle did well in his first two seasons as a PL manager but then lost the plot.
Anyway, I find your ten years thing so hopelessly pessimistic and miserable, I couldn't agree with your views on the long term of the club out of stubbornness to be honest, even if everything else you said rang true. Who wants to accept that their club has gone back ten years overnight? Not me. No offence.
posted on 30/12/12
LH - I know you know nuns and benny in RL, but I am surprised the irony of their doom and gloom is lost on you.
I really hope that 'relegation will/could take us back ten years'.
That would be 2002, and that sounds a great time to go back to
posted on 30/12/12
CEF
I take their doom and gloom in the miserable, dystopian and bleak spirit in which it is intended!
posted on 30/12/12
Nuns I was under total agreement with you about our previous manager. I just can't agree with you. Your rushing into a decision about DF. I think he has a huge job to do beyond tactics. He has to make the club a professional outfit again. MT posted about the entrance down the tunnel situation when his lad was going on the pitch. From the rare one or two people I know who claim to have links in the club it had become more of a social committee than a football club. Everyone enjoyed it but nothing was ever done. That culture has to be changed.
The task of actually training better and planning for games also takes time. You only have to listen to the sound bites that came from Jimmy Phillips and LSL about the shock of what they inherited. This all takes time. I like many others expected to maybe see more of a change in a quicker time span. Are we expecting too much? Depends if it is as bad as I expect.
On the pitch there is a culture of underperformance and disconnection with the fans. That is why I suggest dropping Bogdan. Not because he is bad but that he needs a break from the battering he has had since taking the top jersey. What frustrates the fans is the lack of passion we believe some of them show. One of OC final sound bites was about the fans that were annoyed not knowing anything and how the club was in a good position now. If that has been passed on to the players do we have players who think the fans that boo are just trouble causes? Maybe that is why DF has said he agrees that they are right for a change.