JWSport Jacek Waszak – Sport journalist
19.08.202023 Saturday afternoon saw Bristol City host a clash between two teams who are unbeaten this season. Bristol City were taking on a team from England’s second biggest city, Birmingham City. Both teams recorded draws in their first matches in the league, while subsequent Carabao Cup and Championship clashes saw them emerge victorious. The hosts, in their last away game against Millwall, scored a goal in added time through Matthew James.
The team from Ashton Gate entered the clash without their main striker Andreas Weimann, who is injured and has been ruled out for an extended period.
An interesting player is AlbanianAnis Mehmeti, who will be a threat to our national team defenders in the September match in Tirana.
In the visiting team, Polish national footballer Krystian Bielik is a key player, having signed a new contract with Birmingham that provides him with wages of around £800,000 a year. The media mentioned that a club from the MLS was interested in him, but in the end he remained in England.
As of the new season, Americans, including NFL league legend Tom Brady, have become the main investors in the Birmingham team.
There was a lot of interest in Saturday’s clash and at the first whistle of the referee the stadium was filled almost to capacity with several thousand The Blues arriving from nearby Birmingham.
The match started with a good goal situation for the visitors, who could have scored in the very first seconds after a composed attack. In the first quarter of an hour, both teams struggled in midfield, creating few goal-scoring opportunities. In the 17th minute there was a mix-up in the visitors’ penalty area, who avoided the loss of a goal thanks to the sacrificial intervention of one of the defenders. Much of the confidence in goal was maintained by John Ruddy, an experienced goalkeeper for The Blues having played several seasons in the Premiership with the Norwich team. His several trips out of bounds in the penalty area had the effect of disrupting the hosts’ threatening actions and also … battering his opponents.
Players from both teams tried to break through the tight defensive formation with shots from outside the penalty area. There were few situations within the goal area, apart from ineffective throw-ins into the penalty area, which proved easy prey for tall defenders.
The first half was extended by three minutes, which proved salutary for Birmingham. First they carved out a clear situation for themselves, with Scott Hogan’s shot blocked by a defender and Japanese keeper Koji Miyoshi’s shot knocked out by the goalkeeper. As the saying goes, what goes around comes around comes around in the 48th minute, when Miyoshi entered the scoring list after a mix-up in the goal area. He showed off with a beautiful volley into the top corner of O’Leary’s goal, sending the visitors’ supporters into ecstasy.
The picture of the game changed in the second half and from the first minutes there were many situations under Ruddy’s goal. In one of them The Robbins had a free kick from 18 metres, but nothing came of it. The visitors went on the counter-attack once and could have increased the match’s score, but the goalkeeper was saved by the post.
From the 60th minute Bristol kicked into fourth gear and harassed the visitors’ goal every now and then. Birmingham’s defenders had to concentrate on defending their own goal every now and then, where confusion ensued after effective throw-ins from the side midfielders.
In the 70th minute, The Blues could have scored a goal for 2:0 after a shot from behind the penalty area line and a change of trajectory of the ball by one of the strikers, but luck was on the side of the hosts.
Six minutes later, after a foul in the middle of the pitch, City defender Rob Dickie was punished with a second yellow card and thus had to leave the pitch. After this situation, the team from Cabot City did not give up and in 81 Jamie Knight-Lebel could have scored the equalising goal, but his shot from 5 metres missed the post by a few centimetres.
Bristol, playing in a weakened position, did not avoid the impending execution and the visitors increased the score thanks to Lukas Jutkiewicz. Despite his Polish-sounding surname, he is not Polish but has Polish ancestry through his grandfather, who emigrated to the British Isles decades ago.
In added time, Nigel Pearson’s players bounced off defenders like a wall and even desperate attempts to shoot from 40 metres proved futile.
After the final whistle of the referee, the hosts were booed and booed by their fans, most of whom left the stands minutes before the end of the match.
Numerous Birmingham fans in the stand behind the goal loudly sang their shanties, thanking their players for a successful match. A skilled eye could spot US flags and cheers in favour of the new owners. Perhaps this will be a boost for Bristol City’s owners, who should put the management of the club in other hands, as the Premier League has not been played there since 1992.
Karol Kwiatkowski
