Why Birmingham City still get the blues
Coming from a city of its size, over the years Birmingham City FC must be one of the most underachieving clubs in the entire Football League. And judging from recent events the owners have not learned their lesson.
Just 10 months ago Birmingham were nicely placed at seventh in the Championship table under the guidance of manager Gary Rowett who had enjoyed two relatively successful seasons with the club. But for inexplicable reasons Rowett was suddenly fired by the Chinese owners. Since then things have gone downhill for the Blues and the club are in dire straits
The statistics are grim, but only tell part of the story. Since Rowett’s departure Birmingham have played 33 games, won five, drawn eight and lost 20. That is not promotion form.
Things came to a head last weekend when manager Harry Redknapp was fired, or as the club put it nicely, “parted ways” with the club. This followed a 3-1 home loss to Preston North End, a sixth successive defeat which left the club second from bottom, an unacceptable position for such a large club.
Redknapp had been brought in on a temporary basis for the final three games of last season to rescue Birmingham after a disastrous campaign under Gianfanco Zola who may be a nice guy but unfortunately is not the greatest manager. Redknapp’s mission proved successful, saving the Blues from relegation.
But in retrospect, his decision to carry on was a big mistake and probably few Bluenose supporters will shed tears at Harry’s departure. There are many who feel it is time for Redknapp to call it a day and it will be interesting to see if he takes up another managerial role.
Like Frank de Boer at Palace the previous week, Redknapp felt he had not been given enough time. “I’m disappointed. It’s been difficult,” he said. “I still feel that given time I would have given them a team that would have been challenging for promotion.”
It wasn’t all despair from Harry: “Last season was fantastic, keeping them up in the last game at Bristol City — one of my most enjoyable days in football.”
(If it’s any consolation to Redknapp two other managers were sacked last weekend, Gary Caldwell and Michael Brown, from Chesterfield and Port Vale respectively, both at the wrong end of League Two.)
The book When Saturday Comes, refers to Birmingham FC as “never quite a sleeping giant, more a dozing middleweight” and that just about sums them up.
They have never won the top flight title, their highest position achieved in the 1955-56 when they finished sixth in the old Division One. It was the same year they reached the Cup Final where they were defeated 3-1 by Manchester City. That was the famous final in which Man City’s German goalkeeper Bert Trautmann played the last 20 minutes with a broken neck.
Birmingham had also become the first team ever to reach the Cup final having played all their matches away from home. It was during this period that, because of all the travel to away games, the fans adopted the old Harry Lauder song, Keep Right On To The End Of The Road as the regular club song.
It was the League Cup in which Birmingham have enjoyed their biggest success. Most recently, in 2011, they upset Arsenal in the final thanks to an 89th minute winner by Obafemi Martins.
That was Birmingham’s first trophy since 1963 when, also in the League Cup, they beat their old rivals Aston Villa.
But despite spending half their time in the top flight the Blues have never made a really lasting impression and from 1989-2002 they even found themselves dropping to the third tier of the league for the first time.
Over the years their most outstanding player by a considerable distance was Trevor Francis who joined the club as a youngster in 1970 and scored an impressive 123 goals in 329 appearances. Francis famously became the first player to be transferred for one million pounds when he moved to Nottingham Forest in 1979.
Francis was to return to St Andrew’s in 1996 as a manager, taking over from Barry Fry who was getting increasingly frustrated. Just before he left, Fry was asked in the official Birmingham programme what he would do if he won the lottery. Fry responded: “Buy 27 new strikers.”
On his return to Birmingham Francis found the club was somewhat bloated. He later commented: “When I arrived there were 47 players, and it was 49 a week later when I found two more hiding in the cupboard.”
Like many clubs, Birmingham have suffered from not having the greatest owners, most notably Carson Yeung, a Hong Kong businessman, involved with club from 2007. Yeung’s reign was quite fractious and in 2014 he was jailed by a Hong Kong court to six years for money laundering. The club went into receivership and in 2015 was taken over by Trillion Trophy Asia (TTA) owned by a Chinese businessman.
Birmingham’s immediate task is to haul themselves away from the foot of the table under caretaker manager Lee Carsey. It won’t be easy. Their first match today after Redknapp’s departure is away to Derby County who happen to be managed by a certain G Rowett, who one will not be inclined to do any favours for the club which sacked him so abruptly last December.
One suspects that when Birmingham supporters first began singing Keep Right On To The End Of The Rood back in the 1950s, few of them would have must have realised just how long that road was going to be.