Match Report: Blues 1-1 Northampton Town
A 96th minute equaliser ended Blues' run of consecutive victories at home and leaves Blues second going into the international break.
Northampton Town scored a 96th minute equaliser to deny Birmingham City a sixth straight victory at St.Andrews.
This was another dominant performance from boys in royal blue and they took the lead just before the hour through Jay Stansfield’s fifth in eight league games since returning to the club.
Blues wasted a number of chances to extend the lead and were punished right at the death when Dion Sanderson and Tomoki Iwata errors allowed Mitch Pinnock to send the visitors home happy.
Chris Davies made two changes from the side that beat Sutton United in the FA Cup First Round, bringing Alfie May and captain Krystian Bielik back into the starting XI in place of Luke Harris and Ben Davies, the latter joining Taylor Gardner-Hickman in missing the squad altogether.
It didn’t take long for Blues to get on the front foot, playing with an air of dominance that meant Northampton took 15 minutes to complete ten passes. In that time, Iwata and Alex Cochrane had efforts blocked, a left-wing cross flashed across goal begging for a touch and Stansfield turned to shoot straight at May.
The best chance of the half actually went to the visitors. Sam Hoskins collected on the edge and the shot deflected kindly for the onrushing Jon Guthrie, who was denied brilliantly by Ryan Allsop. They were two of the three shots Northampton had in the first half.
Blues’ issue was that they weren’t quite finding space where space was limited in the final third. Willum Willumson had a shot blocked. A low cross bounced up for Keshi Anderson to poke wide. Stansfield received a cross on the turn but struck against Northampton man and on the stroke of half-time, Willumson was found by a clever Anderson pass but fired over on the turn.
More was needed in the second half and it came.
Within seconds of the restart, Anderson cleverly found May who made the wrong call trying to round Lee Burge rather than shoot. His next key action was more accurate, delivering an excellent cross but Christoph Klarer and Willumson seemed to get in each others way and the ball dropped into the grateful hands of Burge.
Willumson got much better contact on the next cross but headed Paik’s delivery over while Anderson and Cochrane was efforts deflected wide of the goal.
The left-back would play a key role in the goal. Blues built up down the left to work half a yard for the cross. Cochrane’s delivery was excellent and Willumson had escaped Guinness-Walker at the back post. The Iceland man couldn’t cleanly but Stansfield was on hand to fire home from close range.
Our quality didn’t let up and Stansfield found himself heavily involved. He volleyed another fine Paik delivery wide at the near post before being unable to make the most of Ethan Laird winning possession high up the pitch. Anderson then found the England Under-21 international before receiving it back, dribbling past bodies in the area and shooting over.
A corner almost paid dividends when Bielik glanced a header just wide of the far post. Stansfield then connected with a Yokoyama delivery with the outside of his boot but was also off target.
The other side of Yokoyama’s game came to light when Hondermarck read a left-wing cross quicker than him, allowing the wing-back to beat Allsop only to be denied by Bielik on the line.
Any thoughts to the game being over as a contest were squashed when a left-wing delivery found Will Hondermarck in the area, the wing-back beating Allsop but being denied by a Bielik clearance on the line.
That appeared to be that. Cochrane’s cross was headed into the path of Harris, who headed against the bar from a tight angle while Yokoyama had two efforts on goal, the first almost being turned home by Stansfield and the second a tame one for Burge to gather.
That appeared to be that. Yokoyama was again bright and his cross found Harris, who headed against the underside of the crossbar before the Japanese winger had two efforts at goal, the first almost being turned home by Stansfield and the second a tame effort for Burge to gather.
And then we let ourselves. Burge booted the ball down the pitch and Dion Sanderson simply wasn’t paying attention, the ball rebounding off his arm. Then Iwata read the situation, only to pass the ball to Pinnock whose strike was right into the bottom corner.
For the second time this season, Blues draw at home.
Lineups
Blues: Allsop; Laird (Sampsted 74) Klarer Bielik (Sanderson 88) Cochrane; Iwata Paik; Willumson (Dykes 88) May (Harris 62) Anderson (Yokoyama 74); Stansfield. Unused: Peacock-Farrell; Leonard.
Northampton: Burge; Odimayo Magloire (Eyoma 50) Baldwin (Hondermarck 54) Guthrie Guiness-Walker; Pinnock Fox (Dobson 70) McGeehan McCarron (Chouchane 70); Hoskins (Waghorn 70). Unused: Tzanev; Wyatt.
Tactics
Northampton lined up in a 5-4-1 shape. They had very little interest in coming out of that shape.
For them, it was all about protecting their territory. When Blues were in build-up, the back five and midfield four stuck together and didn’t engage until the ball crossed the halfway line, meaning they didn’t really close down Iwata, Klarer or Cochrane until they stepped forward. They were more concerned by the front six.
They didn’t engage. They didn’t fall into the trap of being baited so space would open up. They stuck to their task and blocked off the centre of the pitch completely, forcing Blues wide. They had little interest in following those dropping off. Just defend the territory, defend the space and make sure you mark your men when the ball comes into the box or Blues try and lift it in behind.
The set up meant that Blues could essentially play a 3-1-4-2 with Paik stepping high into the left-attacking midfield position that May tends to adopt when starting off Stansfield, with May effectively playing up top with Stansfield. As is common, Klarer and Cochrane were able to step up the pitch out wide and join in the attack, leaving Bielik and one other to defend with Iwata just in front. For most of the game, Blues were camped within 40 yards of goal.
When they did attack, they primarily tried to use the speed of Akin Odimayo, their right wing-back. Throughout, Northampton went long whenever they had the ball in defensive areas and tried to use width as a way forward. Odimayo is quick, so he would overlap and deliver early in an attempt to win the ball inside the area of win a set-piece.
Northampton made a couple of in-game changes.
1: After the second defender, Jack Baldwin, went off injured, they shifted around their defence. Odimayo went from RWB to RCB; Eyoma went from RCB to LCB; Guthrie went from LCB to CCB and Hondermarck entered at RWB.
2: The triple change on 70 minutes saw Northampton go from 5-4-1 to 5-2-1-2 with Pinnock now playing behind Dobson and Waghorn.
They also had a slight change of tact late on, which was to leave Guinness-Walker out on the left-hand side alone. He received the ball once or twice in space and was able to deliver from deep in hope something might fall.
Players
Let’s get the awkward one out of the way first. Dion Sanderson.
He has the tools to be a good Championship player, and an excellent one at this level. So it’s frustrating that after an indifferent year in the Championship, he’s dropped into League One and struggled on opening day then lost his place after getting sent off in the Carabao Cup and also got injured. He’s bided his time. Couple of decent showings in the EFL Trophy. Returns to league action and... yeah. I feel for him, because the noise is that he’s worked hard this summer to turn things around. But if he’s not in the squad for Shrewsbury away because Bielik, Klarer and Davies are selected ahead of him, he can only look back to the equaliser.
Not that he was alone for the goal. Iwata is a fantastic player and had another good game here. Ultimately, blame is attached because he hasn’t looked up given the ball straight to the only player on the pitch in a Northampton shirt ever likely to hurt us – Pinnock has had a good Northampton career based on the quality of that left-foot. Iwata’s composure and willingness to play under pressure is an important part of what we do, but this isn’t the first time he’s given the ball away in our own box and maybe there is an argument that he should read what’s going on and turn the ball round the corner. I don’t really want to be too harsh on Iwata here as it’s a rare error, but if we’re being objective, he’s just as culpable as Sanderson in the final minute.
Another interesting showing for Yokoyama. He definitely gives us something we don’t have elsewhere in terms of his fearlessness when running at people. It’s not that he doesn’t look at what’s around him, but he’s more likely to drive into space and take somebody on than the more experienced pros around him and that rawness is really useful as games open up. At the same time, we probably saw the other side of his game show with the Hondermarck chance. Being able to concentrate going the other way will be as important as what he does going forward and I suspect it’s why Davies is just holding back for the meantime.
I don’t think anybody really performed poorly on the day. I guess May will find himself frustrated to have played an hour and not had a single attempt at goal. On the other hand, Stansfield, Anderson and Willumson had a combined 16 and found the net just once. There’s a question about Laird and whether he produces enough in the final third. But we’re probably getting into the realms of nitpicking on a day when we’ve had 25 shots and 19 of those from inside the area.
For Northampton, it was again a game where I struggled to really pick an opposition player out. I referenced the speed of Odimayo and that is worth highlighting in my opinion. Cameron McGeehan did himself little harm getting about in midfield and snapping into challenges. And though he struggled for much of it, Pinnock’s quality showed right at the death.
Conclusions
When the final whistle blew, it felt like a defeat.
It was one of those days where I knew I’d be better off writing the following day with a clearer head. And it wasn’t necessarily because I was angry, but because I wanted to be able to collect my thoughts in a way that made more sense.
This was a good performance. We’ve had 78% of the ball. We’ve had 25 shots, 19 of which were inside the Northampton box. Our opponents didn’t complete 100 passes. They completed just two dribbles. We won more aerial duels. Their left-winger had just five touches of the ball in 70 minutes. And that was despite playing against a team that defended in a 5-4-1 shape with everybody within 35 yards of their goal.
It was complete domination from start to finish.
It’s why it grieves so much that we didn’t win the game. We drew a football match against a team that had very little inclination to attack us. Similarities to Sutton where our opponents had three shots and almost stole it with a bouncing volley at the end.
I’m comfortable in giving Northampton their flowers. They came with a gameplan that was about defending their box and hoping they could nick a goal via a set-piece or a mistake and they did that. Most involved will have written this game off, particularly given they were without Tyler Roberts and Tarique Fosu, not to mention chucking Sam Hoskins back into the XI with minimal game time of late. It’s a bonus point and fair play to them.
It ends what has been a strange month. We’ve come away with four wins and two draws but it has oddly felt like a blip. A month where we’ve generally performed well but not really found an extra gear in our play and given up chances we hadn’t done previously. The draws against Mansfield Town and Northampton Town have been very frustrating.
However, I’m not about to sit here and suggest we need to change what we’re doing.
Removing the Fulham U21 game, mainly because I can’t get the stats on Fotmob, the last month has seen us average 74.2% of the ball, 16.4 shots at goal and 3 big chances per game, compared to 6.8 shots conceded and 1.6 big chances. And we haven’t really got out of second gear across the month.
I’m also reminded of two clubs I referenced around pre-season: Wrexham in 2021-22 and Burnley in 2022-23. Both had recent takeovers, had changed managers and had become the team to beat overnight after overhauling their squads.
Wrexham were 7th after 18 games and their home record after 11 matches read won 5, drawn 5 and lost 1, winning by more than one goal just once. As for Burnley, they won 10 of their opening 20 and 6 of their opening 15, sitting top of the division but struggling to put teams away, enduring a lot of low margin affairs and 1-1 draws.
We’re in an excellent position. The team looks good. We are creating chances. We aren’t giving much away. It’s just minor things. And we’re only going to get better.
The only major complaint I have from yesterday is the minute’s silence observed for remembrance day. My opinion is similar to others I’ve seen online – the people shouting across the length of the ground telling people to shut up are just as bad as the idiiots that can’t keep their gobs shut for a minute. I actually saw one father clip his lad round the ear when attempting to give Northampton fans a mouthful.
Just shut up, observe the silence and call whoever is making noise a wanker afterwards.