Birmingham City vs Bristol City - prediction, team news, lineups

Aiming to extremity their location docket connected a precocious note, Birmingham City invited Bristol City to St Andrew's @ Knighthead Park successful the Championship connected Saturday.

Blues moved backmost into the apical fractional of the standings with a win implicit Preston North End earlier successful the week, whilst the Robins snatched a point astatine the South Coast basal of Southampton.

Match preview

Enjoying a affirmative extremity to a disappointing run fixed pre-season promotion dreams, Birmingham City extended their unbeaten tally to 3 matches (W2 D1) with a 2-1 triumph implicit Preston connected Wednesday night.

Finding the nett and providing an assistance wrong the opening 16 minutes of the Second City contest, Ibrahim Osman was the prima of show, handing the St Andrew's assemblage a glimpse astatine the crushed wherefore Brighton & Hove Albion paid £17m for his services successful 2024.

Also breaching the nett of Daniel Iversen successful the Preston goal, Jay Stansfield ended a 13-match extremity drought with a astute finish, joining 10-goal Marvin Ducksch astatine the apical of Birmingham's attacking ranks.

Now looking to grounds consecutive second-tier triumphs for the archetypal clip since the opening of February, Chris Davies's broadside are sitting successful a respectable 10th spot successful the Championship table, 10 points down Wrexham successful sixth spot.

Only champions Coventry City (52), Ipswich Town (47) and Southampton (43) person collected much than Birmingham's 41 location points this season, with Blues losing conscionable 3 of their 22 league fixtures astatine St Andrew's.

Following past season's unsuccessful playoff experience, Bristol City person returned to their modern norm of midtable mediocrity successful the Championship, however, that does not mean that they person stayed retired of the headlines.

Last managing the Robins successful the aboriginal 1980s, Roy Hodgson returned to the West Country nine astatine the opening of April, with the erstwhile England caput manager suffering conscionable a azygous decision successful his archetypal 5 games.

Bristol City's affirmative drawstring of results nether the reign of the experienced 78-year-old continued astatine St Mary's Stadium connected Tuesday, erstwhile a Sam Bell extremity helped the visitors to a stock of the spoils astatine promotion-chasing Southampton.

With a brace of matches against Midlands foe successful the signifier of Birmingham and Stoke City remaining this season, the Robins are sitting successful 12th place, portion of a cohort of teams warring for a top-half finish.

Bristol City person failed to triumph oregon adjacent find the nett successful immoderate of their past 3 trips to St Andrew's (D1 L2), with their astir caller occurrence astatine the Second City venue arriving successful March 2021 by a 3-0 scoreline.

Birmingham City Championship form:

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Bristol City Championship form:

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Team News

Birmingham fans whitethorn person seen the past of Brighton loanee Osman astatine St Andrew's aft helium was forced disconnected successful the archetypal fractional of the triumph implicit Preston.

A Wast Hills academy graduate, Demarai Gray is simply a more-than-capable alternate prime for Blues connected the near flank.

With a presumption to adjacent season, Davies is consistently fielding a guardant 2 of Stansfield and August Priske.

Bristol City stay without the services of Max Bird (muscle), who is expected to miss the remainder of the season.

Reducing Hodgson's options astatine the back, Luke McNally (knee) and Rob Atkinson (ankle) are unavailable.

Birmingham City imaginable starting lineup:

Beadle; Laird, Klarer, Neumann, Wagner; Solis, Paik, Vicente, Stansfield, Gray; Priske

Bristol City imaginable starting lineup:

Vitek; McCrorie, Eile, Borges, Pring; Knight, Morsy, Bell, Horvat, Twine; Burgzorg

We say: Birmingham City 1-1 Bristol City

After a comfortable-enough triumph implicit poorly-backed Preston connected Wednesday, Birmingham should expect Saturday's visitors to beryllium somewhat much alive.

Hodgson has brought caller vigor to Bristol City during the closing weeks of the run and they should prime up a constituent this weekend.

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