Stoke 0 Birmingham 1:BIRMINGHAM stretched their unbeaten run in the Premier League to 11 matches as Stoke suffered another dose of the goal-shy blues.
Cameron Jerome’s bundled, 50th-minute effort was enough to separate the sides, and enough also to equal the club’s longest stretch without defeat in the top flight going back 101 years to 1908.
Remarkably, on that occasion Birmingham were relegated, but there is surely no chance of that happening this time around after a run of seven wins and four draws to lift the Blues up to seventh.
Stoke certainly shaved it in terms of possession in the first half, but when neither goalkeeper has even a routine save to make, it gives you some idea as to the relatively tame fodder served up.
Mercifully, the second half was more of a contest, and the first 15 minutes after the restart had more action than in the whole of the opening 45.
The goal, in the 50th minute, for the Blues was out of the blue, and, perhaps in keeping with what had gone before, it was hardly the sweetest.
Not that that will bother Jerome. There was a touch of good fortune to it as a glancing header from Scott Dann to a James McFadden corner struck the left leg of the unaware Ryan Shawcross, sending the ball spinning into the six-yard box. From three yards out, and on the turn, Jerome managed to bundle the ball home.
STOKE: Sorensen, Higginbotham, Huth, Shawcross, Faye, Lawrence (Sidibe 82), Whitehead, Sanli, Delap, Etherington, Beattie (Fuller 70). Subs not used: Simonsen, Cort, Collins, Pugh, Faye. Booked: Shawcross, Delap.
BIRMINGHAM: Hart, Carr, Ridgewell, Johnson, Dann, Bowyer, Larsson (Fahey 77), Ferguson, Jerome, Benitez, McFadden.
Subs not used: Taylor, Gregory Vignal, McSheffrey, Johnson, Carsley, Phillips. Booked: Carr, Bowyer, Jerome.
Referee: Martin Atkinson
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