I'm not going to go into a systematic report of all the chances in this game - it's been done by thousands of reports by now. The following paragraphs after a brief bit about the stadium are some opinions / general slating of a Birmingham performance for which the term "super ultra defensive" wouldn't suffice.
In terms of the stadium itself I feel like I'd be insulting people's intelligence if I review it! I went last season for a City vs Tottenham league match and the atmosphere was deafening - half the crowd there and a tenth of the enthusiasm last night in comparison but still exciting nonetheless. Closing the top tier as you can see from the picture above was a smart move to make sure most sections below were at least three quarters full.
The programmes are £3 - steep yes but pretty well filled up with info actually, worth it as an occasional souvenir. I can't comment on the food/drink as I haven't looked - I'm presuming the usuals for any team above non league - high prices and mass produced poor quality pies that you'd only go for if you've not had time to have tea before getting there. City Shop's worth a browse if you get there too early but unsurprisingly prices are steep - £8 mugs and glasses the cheapest thing I spotted!
The match itself - obviously the pre-match interest was all about Owen Hargreaves, and to a degree the return of Kolo Toure. The two were perhaps the best performers - to be honest both did very little but did what they had to do well, no City player really had to do much at all for the entire match.
The quotes from Chris Hughton today after what I saw last night are UNBELIEVABLE. I've not seen a side be that defensive for a long time. Whilst not expecting a team from the division below in an away match against a top side to risk piling forward, Birmingham were laughably defensive. They pretty much didn't leave their own half for the opening half an hour, their first chance at all in the 34th minute, and even at 2-0 up they made pretty much no effort to try to get a goal back at all bar a few late half chances by which stage the City players had fallen asleep. Or might as well have.
What did Hughton say? He "hailed" his side's performance, saying "of course we came wanting to win the game" "we put City under pressure" "we were unlucky not to score" and various other lies along those lines. They played merely to not be thrashed, there was never anything other than a City win on the cards from the start, they didn't put City under any pressure at all. It was shockingly defensive - remember how defensive Greece were when they won the Euro Championships? It was much, much worse, as there was never a chance of them snatching a winner, no waiting for the opposition to slip up, nothing like that. They made Greece look attacking. They made McLeish's tactics from last season look attacking. For a Birmingham team that aren't THAT bad at the end of the day, it was a pathetic display of waving a white flag for 90 mins and praying for sympathy.
They did get sympathy in the 2nd half - City got their goals and then gave up really. The whole match really was a training exercise for them - an easy introduction for Hargreaves, an easy reintroduction for Kolo Toure. In fact aside from Birmingham's one fortunate chance on the 34th minute when they surprisingly almost scored, their only other chances were late on when City had spent so long playing a training exercise they'd automatically gone into post-training warm down mode.
It was efficient, tidy and job done from Man City. They did what they needed to do, Tevez and Balotelli moped around doing very little but did enough to create some chances for themselves and Mario got his (uncelebrated) goal. For a team with so many ambitions this season they were never going to put more effort into this than they needed to win it and fair enough really. Aguero an unused sub, just there if he was needed. Birmingham could have made them put some effort in here if they'd have wanted to - but that never happened.
Grateful for sharingg this
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