Birmingham City raised quite a few eyebrows last Saturday when they walked away from Griffin Park with all three points in a 1-0 win away at Brentford.
Birmingham were on the back foot for much of the game as Brentford peppered their goal but just couldn’t make the breakthrough. Birmingham then scored against the run of play and managed to hold on to record a valuable 3 points in Pep Clotet’s first game as Birmingham City manager in the Championship.
Birmingham return to St Andrews for this Saturday’s clash against a Bristol City side who suffered defeat on last weekend’s opening day of the Championship season.
Saturday’s hosts are without last season’s leading goalscorer, Che Adams, who has moved onto Premier league Southampton, defender, Michael Morrison (Reading) and midfield playmaker, Jota (to Aston Villa).
Last weekend, Clotet lined up with a 5-4-1 formation with striker Jutkiewicz operating alone up front, so he may well opt for the same side and formation this Saturday too.
New signing and midfielder, Dan Crowley, impressed in the middle of the park for The Blues, but this looks a more defensive Birmingham outfit at the moment.
Onto Bristol City, and the visitors suffered a heavy 3-1 loss at home to Leeds United on opening day of the new Championship season last weekend.
To make matters worse, this defeat was inflicted upon The Robins at their Ashton Gate ground where they would have fancied their chances against Marcelo Bielsa’s side on opening day.
The west country club now face a tricky looking trip to the west midlands where they’ll be up against a miserly Birmingham defence.
Last season, only 10 of Birmingham’s 23 matches resulted in over 2.5 goals at St Andrews, while only 9 of Bristol City’s 23 away matches resulted in over 2.5 goals on the road last term.
Although Bristol City manager, Lee Johnson, has bolstered his midfield with the quality signing of Massengo from Monaco, the departures of defenders such as Adam Webster (to Brighton) and Lloyd Kelly (to Bournemouth) will be difficult to replace.
Johnson is likely to stick with Diedhiou up front with Weimann and Massengo supporting from midfield.
The Robins will be keen to avoid back-to-back defeats while Birmingham will be hard to beat at St Andrews - a low-scoring game could therefore be on the cards here.
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