Key events
43 min: The expected goals so far: 0.18 to 0.15. Probably not too much by way of surprise in that statistic.
41 min: Anderson curls in from the left. Osayi-Samuel races in, hoping to slam home, but Greaves gets in ahead of him, hooking clear. In any case, the flag goes up – correctly – for offside.
40 min: Anderson scuffs a shot from 25 yards. It’s deflected as well. No good. Easy for Palmer. But then Matusiwa fluffs a pass upfield, and now Stansfield is gifted a chance to shoot from distance. He drags it wide left.
38 min: Szmodics is fine to continue.
37 min: Szmodics sits down so he can get some attention from the physio. As the doc trots on, everyone else migrates to the touchline to get a drink.
35 min: The officials have had a bit of a shocker so far this evening, to be fair.
33 min: A free kick for Ipswich in the centre circle, awarded for a fair challenge by Iwata on Hirst. It’s launched towards Davis on the left. Birmingham stand stock-still, playing the offside trap well. But the flag doesn’t go up, and Davis whistles a shot-cum-cross through the six-yard box. Just as well that didn’t go in, because Birmingham would have had two reasons to complain. No VAR, you see.
32 min: Iwata threads a pass down the inside-left channel for Stansfield, who takes a touch to make space in the Ipswich box before leaning back and larruping over the bar. Palmer should have been put to work there.
31 min: The game settles down a bit, with Birmingham now slowing things down a tad, in order to nix Ipswich’s growing influence.
29 min: Neumann pings a long pass down the right channel for Kyogo, who brings the ball down with a deft touch. But O’Shea comes across to block and clear before the striker can get a shot away. Kyogo looks in fine fettle, his old Celtic self, despite that weird interregnum at Rennes.
27 min: Szmodics, out on the left, has the opportunity to find Hirst in space on the edge of the Birmingham box, but misplaces the pass. After the slowest of starts, Ipswich are beginning to impose themselves on this game.
25 min: Allsop shanks a pass straight to Szmodics, in a pocket of space on the edge of the D. You’d expect Szmodics to work the bumbling goalkeeper at the very least, but he slices a wild shot wide left of the target. A huge let-off for the Birmingham keeper.
24 min: Szmodics wins a ball he had no right to win, out on the left. He loops immediately into the Birmingham box … but none of his team-mates have kept up with play, and the hosts calmly let the ball bounce away from danger.
22 min: Stansfield threads a pass down the inside-left channel for Kyogo, who swivels and aims a first-time shot towards the bottom-left corner. Side netting. Palmer then takes his sweet time over the restart. The home fans are on a rolling boil.
20 min: O’Shea bangs long down the middle. For a second, it looks as though Szmodics will take the ball under control and tear clear. But just as he’s about to enter the box and shoot … hello, Neumann! He appears out of nowhere to flick the ball off Szmodics’ toe. Great last-ditch defending.
18 min: Taylor and Osayi-Samuel bundle each other into touch and square up momentarily. It’s over very little, it has to be said. Both are booked.
16 min: The referee Andrew Kitchen is whistling for anything and everything right now. Neither manager appears particularly happy with his no-contact approach; the crowd are certainly fuming. It’s needlessly stop-start. Plus we’ve already seen a perfectly good goal disallowed as a result of this fussy nonsense.
14 min: Iwata shapes to advance down the middle and is shoved crudely in the back by Hirst. Just a free kick, but the foul stopped a Birmingham attack, and could easily have led to the first booking of the season.
12 min: Birmingham have enjoyed 84 percent of possession so far. Ipswich have been strangely passive.
10 min: Cochrane whips a cross in from the left. Osayi-Samuel romps in from the other flank but can’t connect. This is a fast, impressive start by Birmingham.
9 min: The home fans are furious, and you can understand why. Kyogo eased Greaves out of the road, under a looped pass, and there really wasn’t much in it. The finish was exquisite, too. So close to the fastest of starts in a Blues shirt.
7 min: Kyogo gently nudges Greaves out of the way, under a long ball, and lobs Palmer elegantly from 25 yards. It should stand as a gloriously cheeky goal, but the referee blows for a foul on Greaves. That’s soft, and very generous to Ipswich.
5 min: It’s all Birmingham in terms of possession, the home side buzzing around, pressing hard. Ipswich have hardly touched the ball. When they do finally get it, they deliberately slow things down, Johnson taking an age over a throw. Blues boss Chris Davies isn’t happy at these antics, and tells the fourth official how he sees it.
3 min: A bit of time and space for Anderson out on the left. He’s got four team-mates to find in the Ipswich box, but seriously overhits his cross, which sails harmlessly into the stand behind the goal.
2 min: A rare old atmosphere at St Andrew’s this evening. Expectation ahoy. A quiet start on the pitch, however.
Blues get the ball rolling. The new Championship season is underway!
The teams take to the field of dreams … and it’s the start of a new season, so let us introduce you to their brand-new threads. Blues will be wearing … well, you’d think so, wouldn’t you? But their 2025-26 jersey is bluer than just plain old blue: it’s [squints, adjusts spectacles] “HYPER COBALT”. Ipswich sport their red away kit today, but the shoulders and arms have [moves pince-nez down bridge of nose] “a unique pattern created from the current crest to mark 30 years since the club moved to this version” and also an advertising patch which shills their most famous fan’s hot-sauce business. (And so, already, I’ve now made reference to both Brady and Sheeran. I’m sorry. I have failed you.) We’ll be off in a minute.
Birmingham boss Chris Davies talks to Sky. “It’s the first game … we have a long season ahead of us … I was pleased we got a home game … it’s a bit of a celebration at getting promoted and our first game back at this level … we can share that with our fans … we are expecting a really tough match … the favourites … a really strong team … it suits the occasion … we must prove we can compete … the next game is the most important one and this is it … the next league is usually quicker so we tried to address that … speed and athleticism … could we get more of that in the team? … I think we have managed to do that … more goal threats … we won a lot of games by just a goal … set pieces as well … quality of delivery … still a way to go before I have a squad that is complete and we are happy with … we can’t wait for this game to get going.”
Birmingham co-owner Tom Wagner is at St Andrew’s tonight, and he chats to Sky Sports. “Chris Davies has been unbelievable … for his first coaching gig to set a points record … to dominate the way he did is a testament to the way he prepares the team and squad … keeps them motivated … very, very pleased with the work he has done … with Tom Brady there is no such thing as ‘good enough’, you are either striving for excellence every single day or you may as well find somewhere else to be … that holds true for every member of the organisation … that’s what it takes for us to get to where we want to be … my expectations are that everybody performs at their very best … every member of staff … the folks we don’t see every day … the highest level … it sounds trite to say it, but that’s the reality … I certainly will have nothing to offer on who we should recruit, how we should play and what they should do for the 90 minutes, but I can certainly help with the culture and the attitude … thinking about the game and the experience as a supporter might … what would I want if I were on the other side of the wall? … if you keep that mindset and remember the club is theirs and not ours, you get 99 percent of the way there … we care about this city and the people who live and work here … I trust people will take me at my word when I say that.”
Ipswich boss Kieran McKenna speaks to Sky, and is asked for his thoughts on his side being favourites for promotion. “It’s a positive … it reflects we’ve done some good things over the last few years … in the end it doesn’t mean very much, you have to earn the right every game, every week … there is a lot of work ahead of us … we are ready for the challenge … it’s not alien to us … in League One we were one of the promotion favourites … our depth isn’t what it needs to be in some positions … we’re pretty tight … we expect to be stronger in a few weeks’ time … [Ajax striker Chuba Akpom] has been well publicised … it’s one we’re trying to get done … we’re hoping for good news on that one.”
Birmingham name three debutants in their starting XI. Kyōgo, formerly of Celtic, starts up front, while Bright Osayi-Samuel and Phil Neumann line up at the back. Demarai Gray makes his second debut for his boyhood club, having since played for Leicester, Bayer Leverkusen, Everton and Al-Ittifaq.
Ipswich have one new name in their starting line-up: midfielder Azor Matusiwa. Ashley Young, 40 last month, is on the bench waiting for his first start since his move from Everton.
The teams
Birmingham City: Allsop, Samuel, Klarer, Neumann, Cochrane, Paik, Iwata, Anderson, Stansfield, Gray, Furuhashi.
Subs: Beadle, Laird, Bielik, Cashin, Leonard, Doyle, Gardner-Hickman, Willumsson, Dykes.
Ipswich Town: Palmer, Johnson, O’Shea, Greaves, Davis, Ogbene, Taylor, Matusiwa, Jack Clarke, Szmodics, Hirst.
Subs: Walton, Kipre, Woolfenden, Chaplin, Young, Al Hamadi, Humphreys, Broadhead, Barbrook.
Referee: Andrew Kitchen (Durham).
Preamble
Birmingham City and Ipswich Town return to the Championship tonight, albeit from different directions, and possibly therefore in different moods. Birmingham slummed it in League One last season, racking up 111 points on their way to the second third-tier title in their history; meanwhile Ipswich, having reached the Premier League arguably ahead of schedule, won just four games all season and were cashiered back from whence they came.
Ipswich’s sorry fate won’t have any bearing on the ambitions of these two clubs. Town want to bounce back to the top flight immediately, and are the short-priced favourites to win this division; Birmingham fancy following in Ipswich’s footsteps, given the Tractor Boys were the last team to leap from League One to the Premier League with successive promotions, and they’re third-favourites in the race for glory. Everyone can work out how to stay in the Premier League when they get there.
An exciting way to begin the Championship season, then. The match kicks off at 8pm UK time, and if we can get through the entire evening without reference to either Tom Brady or Ed Sheeran that’ll also be great.
