2010-11 EPL Preview: Birmingham City

Two Balls, One Sash

The English Premier League (suck it, Barclays!) season is just around the corner, so we here at UF are giving you everything you need to know about all 20 teams with our award-winning analysis. And no, we haven’t really won any awards, but neither has Arsenal in five years and people still seem to care about them.

Official Name: Birmingham City Football Club

Nickname: Blues. (Bongo FC can no longer be used as the smut purveyors that used to own the club are now West Ham’s problem)

Home Colors: Blue, a little white.

Trophy Case:
Second Division Titles: 1893, 1921, 1948, 1955
Third Division Title: 1995
League Cup Winner: 1963
Football League Trophy (Johnstone’s Paint Trophy): 1991, 1995

2009-10 League Finish: 9th

2009-10 Average Home Attendance: 25,246 (30,079)

2009-10 Cup Finishes:
League Cup: 2nd Round–defeated Southampton away 1-2. 3rd Round–Lost to Sunderland away 2-0.
FA Cup: Made it all the way to the Sixth Round (Quarterfinals) before losing to Portsmouth away 2-0. Before the loss, BCFC defeated Nottingham Forest 1-0 on a replay, Everton 1-2 and Derby County 1-2.

History: Birmingham City, like many other EPL clubs, began life under a different name. The club, as Small Heath Alliance, was founded in 1875. Three years later, the club’s name was changed to Small Heath FC. It wasn’t until 1943 that the name Birmingham City FC was adopted, though initial attempts to rename the club to the modern name started way back in 1905. At that time, a contentious board meeting settled on the name Birmingham FC instead.

SHFC turned professional in 1885 and was a part of the first ever season of the Football League’s Second Division in 1892. In fact, Small Heath won the league that season, but were denied promotion after losing test matches against Newton Heath (now Manchester United). However, it wasn’t long before Small Heath moved up. The following season, they finished second and were promoted after defeating Lancashire side Darwen FC in another test match playoff.

Birmingham stayed up in the top flight through their next name change, but were relegated in 1908. It wasn’t until 1921 that the club made it back up. They remained in the First Division for 18 years, though they only finished in the top half of the table four times during that span. Shortly after their relegation, football in England was suspended for the Second World War.

Football’s return saw BCFC become a yo-yo club between the First and Second Divisions. It was during this time that Birmingham City had their highest ever domestic finish–6th in 1956. The up and down continued with mostly top half Second Division or bottom half First Division finishes until 1990, when the club was relegated to the Third Division. 1991 saw the club’s worst ever domestic finish–56th on the pyramid. It wasn’t until 2002 that the club made it back up to the EPL, their first season in the top flight since 1986. They have relegated and promoted twice since.

BCFC has four European adventures under its belt, though all in the Fairs Cup, and none since 1962. They did reasonably well, reaching the final twice. They never won, however, losing 4-1 on aggregate to Barcelona in 1960 and 4-2 on aggregate to Roma the next year.

Team Legends:
Trevor Francis. Famous for being the first £1,000,000 transfer–a fee agreed to by Birmingham City from Brian Clough and Nottingham Forest. Before the move in 1979, Francis had been with the Blues for eight seasons, making 280 appearances for the club. Though his real glory days came with other clubs, Francis scored over half of his career club goals with Birmingham City.

Maik Taylor. Still with the club, he will turn 39 next month. A mainstay at the club since 2004, Taylor holds the record for most caps while a Blues player–52.

Joe Bradford. The all-time leading Birmingham goal scorer. Bradford netted 249 in 414 appearances between 1920 and 1935. He also scored 7 in 12 for England.

Pensive Ginger

Gaffer:
Alex McLeish. Spent his playing days as a defender, mostly at Aberdeen. In 1994, his last season as a player, he became player-manager at Motherwell, leading them to a 2nd place finish in his first season. Won the SPL twice at Rangers and took over Scotland in 2007 after Walter Smith left.

Though the SFA denied permission for Birmingham to talk to McLeish, one day after McLeish resigned his NT position, he was announced as the new Blues manager on November 28, 2007.

Transfers In:
Ben Foster (Manchester United, £6m)
Nikola Zigic (Valencia, £6m)
Enric Valles (NAC Breda, Free)

Transfers Out:
Christian Benitez (Santos Laguna, loan return)
Franck Quedrue (Panionios, Free)
Lee Carsley (Coventry City, Free)
Gregory Vignal (Released)

Key Players:

What a Roger Johnson might look like

Roger Johnson. Who? Exactly. Johnson was the only Blue to start every EPL and FA Cup match last season. A central defender, Johnson was signed from Cardiff City before the season for £5,000,000. Suffice it to say, he fit right in during his first season in the top flight. A big part of Birmingham’s mid-season undefeated run and surprising 9th place finish, Johnson was singled out by Sportsmail as the EPL’s 22nd best player last term.

Barry Ferguson. The team’s midfield workhorse last time around, the question is whether the player, who will turn 33 the next time Groundhog Day pops up, can meet the demands of another rigorous season. I’m guessing no.

Foster and Zigic. The two 6 million pound men will be expected to slot in immediately. Foster will likely take over for departed loanee Joe Hart, while Zigic will look to actually score up top, something that largely eluded the target guys for Birmingham last season.

Rising Stars:
Scott Dann. Partnered up with Roger Johnson in the central defense. At 23, he also shone in his first season in the EPL.

Cameron Jerome. Birmingham’s leading league scorer last year with 10 goals in 32 matches. Growth could be stunted by the signing of Zigic, who figures to be more of a mainstay than the departed Benitez.

St. Andrew's Stadium

Stadium: St. Andrew’s Stadium. Opened in 1906, St. Andrew’s has been Birmingham City’s home ground now for over a century. An extensive renovation that ran much of the ’90s saw the stadium take its current form. There is currently some talk of redoing the main stand, but that is in limbo as numerous parties try to decide who will pay for it.

Drama: You know what? There’s not much. Carson Yeung is seemingly happy not to meddle as chairman. There’s no one handing in transfer requests. Alex McLeish isn’t bucking for new signings that the board is balking at. The most you’ll get is the bickering over the Main Stand above. I guess that having the club reach its best finish in over half a century was good for everyone’s mental state.

Tactics!: Birmingham set an EPL record last season by naming the same starting lineup for nine consecutive matches. So, it’s reasonable to assume that McLeish is comfortable running out the 4-4-2 on nearly every occasion. You’ll likely see the same thing this season: Johnson and Dann in central defense with Carr and Ridgewell out wide; the midfield will still consist of Lee Bowyer and Barry Ferguson, and Cameron Jerome will most likely partner with New siging Zigic.

Question Marks: Who scores the goals? As noted above, Cameron Jerome was the top scorer last season with 10 goals, but he wasn’t always first choice. Reputed goal scorer James McFadden has been used in more of a midfield role and the other top choices–Christian Benitez and a very old Kevin Phillips–didn’t cut it. In fact, Birmingham scored a paltry 38 goals in 2009-10, good for 15th in the league. If new 6’8″ striker Zigic doesn’t Crouch some goals, it could be a long, rough slog.

Is this the back to carry the team?

Who finishes the season? This is a team that was overly reliant on players on the wrong side of 30 last season. With no real replenishing signings, that means the bulk of this team will be one year older. And one year slower. Without either a couple of new signings or some youth breakthroughs, look for an Arsenal-length injury list as these old boys break down.

Important Fixtures: Birmigham’s big rivalry in the EPL is with their derby-mates Aston Villa. The first matchup between the two will be on Halloween, with the reverse fixture taking place on January 16.

Other than that, the biggest matches Birmingham will face will be against the four teams that finished closely behind them last season: Blackburn, Stoke City, Fulham and Sunderland. Fittingly, the team’s first two matches–August 14 at Sunderland and August 21 hosting Blackburn–are against teams from this cohort. These matches should help us to tell exactly how the Blues will fare this season. On the other end of the schedule, the season’s penultimate match hosting Fulham on May 15 could be a table placement decider.

Prediction: The problem with Birmingham this time out is that it is very hard for a team of their stature to improve on a 9th place finish (which was 11 points away from 8th), especially when teams like Manchester City and Tottenham have shored up their base. If, then, you figure the top 7 slots are off-limits for this team, then it looks more likely that they drop some. It won’t be significant, as the team seems much stronger than the ones who finished 14th and below last year, but a finish of 11th is much more likely than one in the single digits.