October 2011 Archives

Wednesday, training at the stadium (above).

Venice of the North.

Market Square, Bruges centre, match day.

On me head, son.

The Belfry

Belgian SWAT team mobilised.

Where's Wally?

South End, Birmingham hordes.

Game on.

Got Wood, got the winner.

Joy.

Flag day.

Careful you don't fall, chaps.

Euro stars.

Don't want to go home, indeed.

As the song says, this is certainly the 'best trip'.

It was not just the result in Bruges, but the whole shebang.

It's doubtful we shall see it's like again, or at least for a very long time.

Speaking to some fans afterwards, they were equating it to Wembley and the Carling Cup final up there in the ranks of fondest Blues memories.

I wouldn't go that far personally, but I get the drift.

Before the football, let's deal with the other stuff.

Undoubtedly there was plenty of trepidation about Birmingham City's visit to Bruges among the Belgians.

With 5,450 tickets sold and probably another 2,000 or so as it turned out milling around the medieval city and beyond, just to be part of the occasion, they feared carnage.

The front page of one local newspaper carried a picture of a water cannon with a headline to the effect 'Zulu Army, we are ready for you' the day before the Europa League tie.

At the pre-match media conference I was asked by Belgian television to do an interview and the third question I was asked was would the people of Bruges be safe?

I replied that with so many people flocking to a city there would inevitably be some incidents caused by drink - like on any Saturday night down Broad Street, for example - but to suggest full scale riots, looting and pillaging was incorrect.

Blues fans, I explained, had waited 50 years to follow their team in Europe and were coming for the experience, the football and to make friends.

The policing was sensible and so were the bar owners. Respect works both ways and the scenes in the Market Square on match day, where most fans congregated, were good-natured.

There was an impromptu game of keep-uppy/head tennis when someone lobbed a football into the masses and even when the ball pinged off the top of the stature of Jan Breydel and Pieter de Coninck, Bruges' revered freedom-fighters of the 14th century, the police just smiled.

In fact, there was one funny incident when the ball bounced over to where the horse and carriages, that ferry tourists around, were stationed.

One of the lady drivers was a bit miffed and handed the ball straight to a policeman in expectation that he would administer a ticking off.

Instead, he looked down at the ball, shrugged and volleyed it back into the crowd to great cheers - 'ave it!

Around the ground itself it was lockdown. There were roadblocks, riot vans, water cannons, horses and police in full battle dress.

When Tim Easthope - our award-winning photographer who took the pictures on this blog - and I drove down the main road towards the Jay Breydel Stadion, we were pulled over by one officer, who spotted the British number plate.

'Don't go down there, there's a hooligan pub and they will smash your car up, even if you are driving by'. Lovely.

It's always grand to go into an international break with a victory.

None more so when it's your first away from home, and off the back of a European sortie.

When Blues resume action on October 16 at home to Leicester City, the slog really begins.

Blues must scrunch in 18 games to the turn of the year, and their Europa League group campaign will have by then concluded.

It's a tall order and the two games a week diet will stretch resources and Blues durability.

Hence Chris Hughton has been carefully rotating his team and also deploying different formations.

In Slovenia, we got a first taste of Wade Elliott playing off the front man, in this case Marlon King.

It worked, eventually, when Nikola Zigic came on, just after Chris Burke surged through to score the equaliser.

At Nottingham Forest, with Zigic starting this time, not so. Blues were too wooden, didn't keep the ball well enough and didn't seem to know quite how to play into Zigic.

The change that brought King and Chris Wood into the fray made a difference and, taking the game as a whole, although Blues didn't sparkle, they have played better on other grounds this season but lost.

Zigic is an intelligent footballer and is able to adapt to the personnel around him, and the requirements.

Hughton is still very much feeling his way in regard to Big Ziggy, finding out where he's at his most dangerous and which tactics and formation best to use.

And with a whole host of new team mates as well, it remains a getting to know you process for all concerned.

Let's not forget that not only has he just returned from injury but the huge turnover in players and staff with all that's been going on off the field meant that to expect Blues to hit the ground running in August was unlikely.

The Championship has hardly got into its stride and that suits Blues. I expect them improve and maybe come up on the rails at the business end of the campaign, like Steve Bruce's Blues of 2002 did.

Undoubtedly there are goals in this team. They have scored in every league game so far.

Under Hughton, Blues have players who can beat a man and stretch the play, and make things more dynamic rather than formulaic.

This was something that Maribor coach Darko Milanic picked up on.

"We knew they were dangerous," he said after Blues 2-1 victory.

"There is a lot of one to one playing with them and, unfortunately, this kind of thing keeps happening to us: we have a lack of quality, especially when it comes to handling fast players on the wings."

Four days after playing Leicester, Blues face Club Bruges in Belgium. It should be quite a game, quite an occasion.

According to the authorities I asked in Maribor, there could be 8,000, probably more, Blues fans going over.

The atmosphere so far in Europe with Blues has been carnival, top class. People are treating the jaunts abroad as a once in a lifetime opportunity to see Blues on this stage, without putting any pressure on the team.

The trips are like glorified stag weekends and it certainly helps when the local police keep their distance and go about their business in a softly-softly manner, as did the forces in Madeira and Maribor.

With such an invasion heading Bruges' way, of course, there is the scope for it to be very different later this month.

But the underlying feeling among Blues fans seems to be that they are enjoying the ride on the European tour, for as long as it lasts.

And although Bruges' stoppage-time shock victory against SC Braga in Portugal wasn't the ideal result for Blues, another sterling away performance - in a stadium where the noise will be coming from Brummies - then who knows?

Bruges are third in the Belgium Pro League and have yet to lose. They have won five and drawn four of their matches.

They are captained by ex-Albion and Stoke City defender Carl Hoefkens and another ex-Baggie, Ryan Donk, is his deputy and in top form.

Speaking to a couple of Belgium journalists about them, Bruges are a good, solid outfit, but they will be wary of Blues, the group wild card with nothing really to lose.