Birmingham City 1-1 Ipswich Town

Written By: Oliver Osborn (The Bluenose Bible)

Birmingham City picked up their first home point of the season thanks to a late Chris Burke equaliser against Ipswich Town at St. Andrews.

Lee Clark kept faith with the 4-4-2 that saw his side over the line away at Yeovil in the Capital One Cup on Tuesday, but brought in Darren Randolph and Peter Lovenkrands to replace Colin Doyle and Matt Green respectively.

It was Ipswich who started the brighter though as the Tractor Boys looked lively right from the off, possibly because they hadn’t played a midweek game, unlike Blues.

One of those vibrant Ipswich players was David McGoldrick who sent two headed efforts over the bar from Aaron Cresswell’s dangerous crosses early on and it wasn’t long before left back Cresswell provided another pin point cross for the opening goal.

On his first start for the visitors since his move from Wolves, Christophe Berra gave Ipswich a deserved lead midway through the first half.

Blues failed to clear the ball far enough out from a corner and Creswell put in another superb delivery for the centre half to score his first goal in English football.

After going behind the home side failed to create many chances in the first half and a header from Andrew Shinnie and long range effort by Scott Allan that were both hit over the crossbar again showed where the problems lie for Lee Clark.

Their inability the keep the ball in midfield and lack of width down the left meant that Clark’s side resulted in too many long balls up to Lee Novak, who again was unable to improve on his poor form.

McGoldrick had one final chance in the first half following a good turn that stung the palms of Randolph which the Irishman pushed onto the post.

Birmingham got into the game a bit more just after the break and efforts from Novak and Allan suggested that they weren’t out of it yet.

Randolph was again in the thick of the action, however, when McGoldrick and Cresswell came close to doubling Ipswich’s lead, but the goalkeeper showed why he is already a fan’s favourite at St. Andrews with a couple of cracking saves.

Chris Burke has had to wait patiently for his chance this season due to the change in formation employed by Clark, but in his first league start of the campaign the Scot scored an equaliser in the 75^th minute.

The right winger picked up the ball just inside the Ipswich Town box and his trickery left Cresswell in a muddle before taking a shot that was deflected into the top corner of Dean Gerken’s net for the club’s first home league goal of the season.

It was almost two goals in quick succession, but Allan couldn’t direct his effort on target from the edge of the box.

A free kick to Ipswich from 20 yards out gave McGoldrick one final chance to snatch a late winner except it just wasn’t meant to be when his powerful effort crashed against the wall before referee Drysdale blew his whistle for full time.

Birmingham manager Lee Clark:

“At least in the second half the players were true to themselves as individuals.

“We did not create any chances in the first half but we had a go in the second half and had a bit of luck with a deflection to give us the equaliser.”

“It was no coincidence that Chris Burke obtained the second half equaliser. He works every single day to perfect scoring such goals.”

Ipswich manager Mick McCarthy:

“We came up against a goalkeeper in Randolph who is in outstanding form and they had the get-out-of-jail freak goal.

“I hope we have get a slice of luck like that at some stage in the season.

“Honestly, it feels as if we have been beaten.”

Starting line up: Randolph; Eardley (Allan 34′), Bartley , Burn, Robinson; Burke, Adeyemi,  Spector, Shinnie (Ferguson 58′); Novak, Lovenkrands (Green 65′)

Unused subs: Doyle, Reilly, Elliott, Mullins

Man of the match: Darren Randolph