Bristol City 0-1 Birmingham City

Written By: The Bluenose Bible

Wade Elliott’s winning goal seals Bristol City’s relegation with three games remaining after a six year stay in the Championship came to an end at Ashton Gate for the West Country side.

The early stages were fairly even as both sides created good chances to score what would be a vital first goal to either inspire a survival push or stick the final nail in the coffin for Bristol.

Steven Davies had the first chance, but his effort was well blocked by Paul Robinson following a good delivery from Sam Baldock.

Minutes later, Shane Ferguson put in a teasing cross from the left to Nikola Zigic who brought a terrific save out of Tom Heaton, although it wasn’t long before Blues opened the scoring.

A great run by Nathan Redmond past two Bristol defenders resulted in a ball to Elliott who fired home into the bottom left corner to score his ninth goal in all competitions.

It wasn’t the only great bit of play produced by Redmond as the winger looked dangerous running at Bristol defence and even created a chance for himself by hitting a shot just wide before referee Naylor blew for half time.

The second half saw much of the same with a quite even game with few chances being created despite the hosts knowing they needed a win.

Chris Burke went close late on to doubling Blues’ lead as his scrappy effort was cleared well off the line by Matthew Bates.

But the away defence held on to record ten away points from a possible twelve to almost guarantee another season in the Championship and move into the top half of the table.

Bristol City manager Sean O’Driscoll:

“That result and performance sums up the club’s season. The players gave it everything in the second half, but couldn’t take the chances.

“We needed promotion form when I took over and that is not easy with the same group of players when you are bottom of the table.

“There will be changes in the summer and we will do our best to provide a vibrant young team, who can take the club up again.

“It is no good having an academy if you are not ready to use the players it produces. The fans have stuck behind us brilliantly and we want to reward that.”

Birmingham boss Lee Clark:

“We are not quite mathematically safe and it would be nice to take care of that with a good result in front of our own fans on Saturday against Leeds.

“We owe them a big performance because we have not been at our best in recent home games.

“Now I want a really big effort at St Andrews because there are a lot of positives to take from the second half of our season.”

Man of the match: Nathan Redmond