Into the Valley

And there we have it: Blues out of the automatic promotion places for the first time since the opening week of February.

Sheffield United kept their astonishing run of form going at Reading, winning their fifth straight match for 10 unbeaten in all.

Blues now have to respond tomorrow at Charlton Athletic in what has become a sort of game in hand on the top pair.

Wolves defeat of a shambolic Southampton was no great surprise this Easter Friday, especially after such a quick start.

Yet Sheffield keep getting the job done and their goal difference, which is nine better than Blues', enabled them to barge Big Eck's boys out of the way.

In some respects, it's no bad thing that Sheffield beat Reading from Blues perspective.

The bigger the gap the better considering the last day meeting between the teams at the Madejski Stadium.

Now it's just a case of blunting the Blades and we've seen how significant that ridiculous penalty was at Bramall Lane a few weeks back, haven't we?

Join us on www.birminghammail.net tomorrow when we will be at the Valley bringing you all the action and gossip via our live match blog.