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Sinking the Seagulls? Brighton Preview
Lee Clark’s Birmingham City welcomes a Brighton and Hove Albion side who are yet to taste victory this term in today’s Championship clash at St Andrews. Despite opening the scoring in each game Brighton have lost all three games they have played this season including a shock upset in the Capital One Cup and they will be looking to put points on the board.
Brighton and Hove Albion
The Seagulls are struggling under new manager Oscar Garcia, who took over from Gus Poyet in the summer after the Uruguayan’s controversial sacking. They have yet to pick up a point and are struggling without influential players such as Liam Bridcutt who is out with a hernia op.
Andrea Orlandi is a doubt and full back Bruno will probably miss out but Brighton could include former Blues players Matthew Upson and Kemy Agustien in their lineup. Ulloa has looked threatening up front for the Seagulls with two goals so far this season.
Blues
Lee Clark welcomes back Mitch Hancox to the squad after the young left-back missed a couple of games after a freak training ground accident saw Hancox receive an elbow into the groin. Darren Ambrose, Will Packwood and Jonathan Spector are all nearing fitness but won’t be considered yet whilst Nikola Zigic and David Murphy remain sidelined.
Clark will have to decide whether to stick with Hayden Mullins at centre back and continue to leave out Kyle Bartley; Chris Burke is pushing for a start but again it will be difficult to slot him into the 3-5-2 that Blues are using this season. One player who definitely won’t feature is Marlon King as Clark has confirmed King is completely out of his plans and will leave by the end of the transfer window.
Blues are rated as outsiders by the bookies for this one but I think we could do this; Brighton haven’t started well and with the Blues crowd behind them as they have been all this season Clark’s men could run out winners. Blues have by all accounts done fairly well this season and another performance with high energy and tempo should do it.
Please note that as I am out of the country I won’t be writing a match report on this fixture.
Tags: Brighton and Hove Albion, Hayden Mullins, Kyle Bartley, Mitchell Hancox
65 Responses to “Sinking the Seagulls? Brighton Preview”
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As long as Blues show the commitment and effort from the previous 3 games, and the team continue to bond, then with a little bit of luck and good fortune, the 3 points hopefully will be in the bag.
I will be in my office reading the commentary as long as the Internet stays on line.
Enjoy your weekend in Honkers, and get yourself to Ned Kelly’s.
KRO from Kazakhstan.
Never come across this site before;
http://swissramble.blogspot.co.uk/
Makes interesting reading on Blues past finances and comparisons with other Championship clubs.
KRO
Morning, Blues to win this one 1-0 and plaudits for another clean sheet, KRO
1-1 i reckon – shinnie to score, in trouble brighton will pack ten men behind the ball. We have no quality striker to break anyone down at the moment – very worrying !!
I feel we need to give our strikers a chance to settle. It’s still very early days. The goals will come.
Blues imo will win this match 2-0 one of the strikers to score. Reading the ref’s report by Dan hopefully he keep his cards in his pocket………….. Again this will be a real confident boost for blues, really could not give damn about the seagulls predicament……………..another 3 points will do nicely……………………i will be there to roar our team on………………….kro
regarding Marlon really pleased Clark has stuck by his guns that he wont play in a blues shirt again………….iimo this is the right decision, the quicker Marlon moved on the better for the sake of bcfc. Clark can then make further inroads in getting players who wish to play for bcfc………..kro
What if he has not gone by end of transfer window Mark ?.After all hes not bothered still picking up his 20k a week
Serious question Tony – are you happy about anything? I see you comment here a lot and you never seem to be happy at all.
Let go, move on. King will go. Trust me.
He definitely won’t play for the club again. According to Lee Clark this morning, King would have gone by now… but other clubs have suddenly come into the picture, so he has more options now. You can’t blame the bloke for taking his time to get it right. This might be his last contract.
Hope the lads can put on a good performance, wonder if either Burke or Allen playing just behind a single striker may carry a bigger goal threat than the current 2 strikers, one who is not prolific and the other still a novice at this level.
http://www.birminghammail.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/lee-clark-marlon-king-still-5742429? cheer up tony………
same team has last saturday apparently, cant argue with that because they all put in a shift
at yeovil and burn, mullins, elliot and shinnie as stand out players in my opininon, 3-1 i
reckon , novak, green, shinnie scoring.KRO.
Dan thats hardly fair it should be obvious King scores goals, goals equate to points on the board and for Clark to say playing him would give us a false sence of security is just ridiculous. I can be one of the happy slappers if you wish I can keep smiling as we sink further and further into obscurity.
Idont think
Tony
If I’ve said it once, I’ve said it a few times. There is more to this than him scoring goals. He is leaving, deal with it.
King is swanning around Europe looking for a club or so he says, there seems no urgency on his part or our part, we just keep paying him.
Another cause for concern is Murphy how much longer is he going to be missing? are there any stats in here who could tell me just how long he has been with us, and how many games he has played in that time?. He is starting to look a little like Steve Carr who had interest apart from Football.
Tony,
Don’t take this the wrong way, but log off the computer, get yourself a drink of something nice, and relax.
Serously, you’ll live longer. This is going to be a rough season and if you think it’s that bad now… it could be a whole lot worse.
What a great idea. I’ll drink to that. Cheers!
COYB.
marlon kings off field antics are enough for lee to disown him, hes a liability bot to be fair
is record for us is good but hes going and thats it, as for murphy they think another month
or so, but anyway he woudent get in clarks 3-5-2 formation with ferguson around so no
need to rush him back.KRO.
You know what Daniel you could be right, think I will do just that,, there must be some kind of toxicity going round that causes total apathy, miraculously I seem immune.
Apathy?
Or maybe people just don’t see it your way?
last post before im off to the game, were all entitled to our opinion weather it slating the
players or praising them, ill do it myself no dough during todays game, but as long as you
pay your money and go and watch them week in week out like i do then no one and i mean
no one can have a go at you for saying what you think weather it right or wrong, fact or
fiction and thats where i stand on the mater so see you later, up the blues, KRO.
Will Packwood predicts 2-1 Blues. Think I agree with that.
Think they may see it my way now
Not really……….
One freak own goal in 3 games says it all.
Still early days, but we badly need someone who can score goals.
Really can’t see how or where goals will be coming from after that display.
Keep the faith, Owen Goal will be our saviour!
My guess is, that Lee Clark is desperate for King to go, so he can bring in another striker before the window closes.
If we bin the 3-5-2 (please God) and revert to 4-4-2 or 4-5-1, we’ll have to full back and two wingers/wide men working in tandem. That way, we’ll get round the back of defences and actually give our strikers a chance to score. Oh… and we need to practice our crossing. It’s atrocious, has been for a season or two.
Get Murphy back as left back, push ferguson up left wing, bring Burke back. We have scored one goal( and that was an own goal )in three games, lost our opening two games at home.
The word is out score against Birmingham and you have a great chance of winning. As Tatts says no cutting edge whatsoever.
Overall, we’re not playing that bad, we just need to find a cutting edge at the top end. But you can’t put all the blame on the strikers.
As I said enough times, with this 3-5-2 formation, we have no width, so the strikers are having to constantly look over their shoulders waiting for the odd through ball and the opposition defences can easily cut those out, because they’re facing the ball. Instead, our strikers should be facing goal and running on to decent crosses, with midfielders following up. The only way to do that, is to get behind defences.. and the only way to do that, is to have proper wide men who can cross a decent ball.
It ain’t rocket science.
Exactly Staffs Ferguson and Burke, forget this system go 4-4-2 get the two widemen going down the flanks, if we come across a Watford or a Hull they can drop back. Get big Zig back asap I, know your not that keen on him but hes worth it if for nuisance value alone
We are so predictable
The thing that’s always annoyed me the most about Zigic… is his (almost) total inability to head the ball with any conviction. He’s what.. 6′ 7″? I’m only 5′ 8″ and, even at age 60, I can still head the ball better than him. If I was his height and was as cr*p in the air as him, I’d hang my head in shame. We should be tearing every team apart with his height, but we don’t. If he made up for it with a fair few goals with his feet (and we’re told he’s technically very good) I wouldn’t mind so much…. but I can’t remember many players who have missed as many sitters for Blues as him (no, not even Jerome.)
Ok, rant over. I won’t criticise him again on these pages, because it’s pointless. I just hope, for his sake at least, he has a good season and proves me wrong. I’m big enough to wish him good fortune (no pun intended.)
I do agree 100% with your view that we can use the 3-5-2, if and when necessary, maybe away from home…. but sorry Lee Clark, at home we expect a more attacking philosophy, and 3-5-2 just ain’t.
(I’m sick of hearing myself say it now, but) Get Eardley/Burke and Hancox/Ferguson in tandem on the flanks. Then, maybe play a holding midfielder, with three attacking midfielders in front of him and a striker. 4-5-1 / 4-3-3 (or 4-4-2) is the way to go.. at least at home.
There are no goals in this team.If Marlon isn’t going to play for us again,at least bring Lovenkrands back.Dan,instead of having a go at people wanting King to play,tell us whats gone on with him.you make out you know of things that’s happened.So tell us.
We’d all love to know Steve. Unfortunately, OP ain’t gonna leave his arse wide open to the court bandits… and you can’t blame him for that.
Both Paul Robinson and Neal Eardley are on 3 bookings in 4 games now. Dan Burn is one behind on 2. It’s a good job Packwood, Spector and Murphy are due back soon, we may need them sooner than we think.
Imo blues have been extremely unlucky in the two home games. With more self belief in the blue shirt they could quite easily have finished off both teams. But we are bcfc and we never do it the easy way………i am of the belief we will turn it around, a bit of that lady luck and we will fine remember Rome was not built in a day…… How unlucky can you get hit the crossbar twice……….if they had gone in who knows…..
I have no doubt they’ll come good mark… but we’ve got to give them a chance. They’re an almost totally new squad, so to have to get to know each other, AND a completely new system to most of them, it’s going to take a while to gel properly. But I do think we need to give our strikers a fighting chance too. We need to get them coming on to balls, attacking it, instead of having to wait for passes to come from behind them. Get to the bye-line and get crosses in.
…. and make sure they’re not straight into the keepers hands all the time. Jeez, it’s not that hard to bend the ball away from the keeper.
Totally agreed staffsblue- this can be very frustrating glad I still got my hair lol……
I might start on my teeth only joking…….
It used to be my fingernails. lol
Imo I love new formation, yes this will take time…… For me 451 with lone striker hey I know nothing lol…….reading that clark has said he was bitterly disappointed, hopefully it will filter down to the players what clark expects from them……….
The goal came in the same manner most of last season…. the middle being left open and no one picking up the runner. With a defensive midfielder, that shouldn’t happen… but we don’t have one. None of the midfielders we have seem up to the job.
This where callum or possibly spector could slot into that defensive midfielder role maybe? Just thought…..
I know this might be controversial… but I’d give Robbo a crack at the job. :-)
I’m a big fan of Callum Reilly and thought he would be ideal for the job, but after watching the way he was muscled out of things against Plymouth, I think they need to beef him up a bit first.
Main reason I don’t like 3-5-2, is that it requires the full-backs/wing-backs to cover the whole of the flank, offensive and defensive. It’s one thing to play full back and venture forward when the opportunity arises.. it’s a totally different thing to have to shuttle up and down for 90 minutes. That’s a hell of a shift to have to put in and, if you ain’t got a great engine, you’re going to struggle… as I think Eardley is. Plus, the wing backs don’t like going too far forward, in case they get caught out behind, which is why, instead of getting past the opposition, they’re going so far and just banging a long diagonal ball, more in hope than anything.
Thats a fair opinion regarding robbo………myself prefer 451 we did extremely well we mass alot points with this system. Imo I believe we were more stable at the back, winning anything its about stopping the opposition scoring………then making sure when your chances come along you bury them……blues need to learn how to win ugly………
I made a point about our strikers last season, that if we have 3 or 4 that aren’t scoring… then why bother playing 2 of them in a game? The result will still be 0. Better to play one striker, with one or two players supporting from behind. That’s why 4-5-1 (with a defensive midfielder) would suit us best at the moment… at least until the strikers start firing.
What amazed me is we losted two games by 1-0s so we are not million miles away………especially when alot of fans thought watford were going to hammer us………..
We’re just a flick or a cross away from taking off imo. Like Lee Clark says, it’s just a few things that need tweaking. I’m hoping that a lot of the new players aren’t suffering a bit of stage fright at home.. a bit like last season. But, like you said mark, although we’ve lost two, they’ve only been by one goal each time…. which is light years away from the demoralising 3s, 4s, and 5s of last seaon.
Looking forward to the leicester game would love to see a 6-2 again lol
I’m sure Kenny would be up for it. ;)
Just over 13’000 Blues supporters turned up to watch the game.
To me this speaks volumes about the current state of the club and the level of supporter apathy.
Sorry to say its going to get worse and in the meantime the Scarlet Pimpernel has disappeared.
Maybe the extra 5,000 at the watford game must have been to see if any miracle would happen…….
hopefully when king goes it will free up some finance to get billy sharp or similar quality striker in – otherwise we will be in a relegation dog fight.I fear us doing a wolves – although the club would be cheaper to buy for a local based , business consurtium !!
Billy Sharp?
No chance.
Even if king goes, we have got no money
sitting- Billy sharp would be would be wonderful aquistion unfortunately it comes down to marlon funds been made available……..
hi all………got to agree with the comments about “proper wingers” but everything about the match was very poor….except to say it was nice to see the club involving the young supporters in the pre match build up….until we have zigic back to see if the forwards are capable of getting on the end of a few knock downs……dismal day out!!!!!!!
Ican not see it getting any better while the club is in turmile.We have a team made up of other clubs cast offs,goal scorers from lower leagues,conferance and low Scottish football, this is a different world, plus a few untried young players.You can not blame LC, He has had to shop with no money, not evan a credit card. Even if new owners are found it will no easy matter to turn the club around. As the saying goes YOU CAN NOT MAKE A SILK PURSE FROM A SOWS EAR
Ken – you are spot on !!!!!! – Untill the cancer is cut from the body the body will continue to deteriate untill it succumbs to the inevetible !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Still going on and on and on about new owners as if the fairy godmother going to come…………i still waiting for t-rex to return so I go on his world tour………yeah right…… Blues forever not just for the wembley…….