The mood at Birmingham has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Squad29 Jan 2046
Sergio Montes falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
The mood at Birmingham has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Birmingham will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Christopher Parker will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Birmingham the goodbyes have quietly begun.
He left as a boy and has come back still knowing where the away end is. Most signings have to be explained to a town; this one needed a photograph and nothing else.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
The mood at Birmingham has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Birmingham will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Birmingham they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
6 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Jim Thwaites commits to Birmingham for another 2 years.
Squad4 Dec 2045
Sergio Montes falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
The words a physio says slowly. 37 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Nobody at Birmingham will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
Clubs make promises constantly and the page usually only hears about them when they are broken. This one was honoured, and the dressing room noticed that faster than any supporter did.
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Birmingham, and it is not being withdrawn.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Birmingham they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad16 Oct 2045
Words at Birmingham training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Sergio Montes is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
A 6‑2 win over Milton Keynes Dons, a place in the next round, and the quiet arithmetic every supporter does on the walk home: how many more until a final?
There is exactly one of these per career and it does not usually go like this. 1 on the scoresheet, 8.01 beside the name, and a crowd that had never seen him before chanting it by the end.
Player ratings26 Sep 2044
A brace, and Robert Howard takes the afternoon — 8.77
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Robert Howard provided it, and the 8.77 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Liam Parker will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Birmingham the goodbyes have quietly begun.
8 goals in one match, Robert Howard on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Birmingham and Milton Keynes Dons.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 17-year-old it feels ownership of. Harry Price has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
In brief
SquadTyler Dibling has become a man the manager trusts