It was end to end stuff today at St Andrews in the 10th West Midlands local derby of the season and goals by the two centre halfs, Roger Johnson for Blues and James Collins for Villa, settling the final score at 1-1.
Villa may be the happier side with their point away from home after pressure mounted on them to equalize in the cauldron of St Andrews. The point means they have climbed out of the relegation zone whilst keeping their 2nd place in the Braggers' League table.
Birmingham's form in the derbies this season continues to be poor with just two points gained from 5 local derbies. These are the results from the 10 West Midlands derbies in the Premiership thus far this season:
Blues 1 Villa 1
Wolves 1 Blues 0
Villa 2 Albion 1
Albion 0 Stoke 3
Stoke 3 Blues 2
Villa 0 Blues 0
Wolves 1 Villa 2
Albion 3 Blues 1
Stoke 2 Villa 1
Wolves 2 Stoke 1
Bonus points
Whilst bagging a bonus point for their streaker this afternoon, Blues would be docked points for a case of "empty seats m'lud, empty seats", with 4,000 unsold seats resulting in huge gaps in the stands on Match of the Day. This was in spite of an allocation of only 1500 seats to Villa supporters. Not great for a derby. Clubs should be able to ensure the safety of supporters without banning away fans and then not even being able to fill the reusultant gaps with home fans. This is small club mentality from Birmingham City who clearly have a problem with stewarding St Andrews and I speak from the experience of having plastic seats raining down on me and my children from the top tier of the Railway End housing home fans who were also kicking down their own safety barriers on the pitch in front of us at the end of our last encounter, whilst freelance stewards who admitted to me that they had never been in St Andrews before in their lives stood by looking as helpless and scared as we felt.
Apparently two flares managed to get through the turnstiles again today and security men only made themselves known after the streaker managed to take off his kit and leap onto the pitch. If Blues are to continue playing Premiership football next season, they need to put the amateurish Brady Bunch / Trevor Francis 'toys out of pram' days behind them and start behaving with a bit more class. Birmingham are fast becoming the Milwall of the West Midlands. 5 bonus points docked.
Birmingham rivals Villa and Blues go head to head at St Andrews at lunchtime today and following on from the dramatic Carling Cup semi final a few weeks ago which saw the Noses snatch the win with home fans flooding onto the pitch as if they'd won the Champions League, Villa will surely be up for revenge.
But with both teams desperate for points at the embarrassing foot of the Premiership, it could go either way and we should at least be guaranteed more of a contest than the boring draw at Villa Park back in October.
Following recent criticism from brain-of-Britain Ian Holloway, which Villa legend Stan Collymore has since labelled disrespectful, Villa boss Gerard Houllier should aslo have a point to prove as well as a job to hang onto in the middle of a continuing global economic crisis. So how brave will French man Houllier be in defending his dodgy wicket especially when we all know that the French don't understand the game of cricket anyway, let alone play it?
Villa fans will be hoping that Gabby Agbonlahor does the business today and that another lifelong Villa supporter, Marc Albrighton brings some much needed derby day enthusiasm into the encounter. But with Ashley Young and Emile Heskey suspended, Houllier may have to start his out-of-favour striker big John Carew.
Alex McLeish of course has his own giant front man these days in 6ft 8 inch Nikola Zigic, although Zigic's recent failure to make an impact on games has led to McLeish looking to bring Spurs hero Robbie Keane to St Andrews, though not in time for today's clash. Anothe former Spurs player, David Benntley, will be playing for the Noses today, though defender Scott Dann is out with an injury. Blues should still take the points today as the passion of the home crowd will be the vital 12th man in this high stakes game. Though having said that, there were several notable occasions some years back when Villa were favourites for the home victory and we all know what happened then.
Local pundits are suggesting today's match will be brutal with Birmingham fans relishing the prospect of cementing Villa's place in the bottom three.
Shame Villa were only allocated 1500 seats for this game, although this is in keeping with the tactical meaness of Birmingham as a club in the days when the Brady Gang hiked prices up for the fixture over and above what Villa charged both sets of fans.
