Birmingham City - Implementing a cantera policy

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May

A solid start to the month with a good win away from home against Brighton. We really are looking like a solid Premier League team at the moment. Hopefully, with the right additions over the summer, we can look at maybe putting together a run for Europe next season.

It is these types of results that are stopping us having that run for Europe. Every now and then we put in a poor performance and lose a game we could possibly win. It is going to happen while we have the quality of players we have. The one thing we need to try and improve on is our consistency.

It is a nice end to the season with a strong 3-0 win against Leeds. We were strong at the back and barely gave anything away while we took our chances up top. It is nice to finish with a win, especially after the poor performance against Fulham beforehand.

Summary

The final month of the season only had 3 games and we finished the season strongly with 2 wins from those 3 games. The loss to Fulham was disappointing but we played well in that game and and have the foundations to the team ready to build on. Johannesson came in for Bellingham and performed well while he was out. It means I should have 3 strong CM options for at least half of next season (the loan of Johannesson runs from January to January). I'll go the team in more detail in my end of season post.

Player of the Month
Nathan Redmond

League Table

 

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End of Season Post

The second season has finished and it has been a major success. I went into the season hoping to finish 17th and stay up. We have ended up finishing in 8th place and only 1 point from a European place. We started okay and looked to be aiming for a 12th-17th place but then, around November, we switched tactic and that really was the change of our form. We looked so much better in the new formation and it seemed to suit almost everyone in the team. As always I am still tinkering with the tactic as I don't think the balance is quite right on the right hand side of the pitch but even with that slight imbalance, we looked a much stronger team and showed performances that lets me think we can repeat that kind of league finish again.

We didn't have a great run in either cup this year. Very similar to last year. I want to try and go further in one of the cups next season. It is going to take a long time for us to compete for any kind of league silverware so competing in the domestic cups are going to be the best way for us to aim to win anything.

Final League Table

I'm really pleased with our 8th place finish but there are much bigger shocks than that. The biggest shock has to be the fact that Leicester have been relegated after finishing in 19th place on 34 points. They struggled all season and were always looking likely to get relegated. They have both James Maddison and Callum Wilson that I would like to sign. Both are unlikely to want to join, especially Maddison who is wanted by other teams at the moment, but you never know what could happen over the summer. The other shock is Everton finishing 4th bottom and only staying up due to goal difference. They had an incredibly poor second half of the season and won just 2 games in 2022.

Squad

Goalkeepers - Etheridge started the season as the main goalkeeper but during the season I decided to switch to Sarkic and he delivered so he took the no.1 jersey for the remainder of the season. I plan on trying to sell Etheridge this summer and then replacing him with a backup goalkeeper who fits into our transfer policy.

Defenders - The back 4 was pretty settled as Colin, Collins, Hause and Lowe all played over 30 games during the season. They all performed well with Collins in particular looking like a very good signing. Both January signings, Suliman and Harris, didn't get much game time due to Collins and Hause performing well and remaining fit. I can't imagine there being too many changes in the defense over the summer with the only position that could change being LB if I am able to sign Rico Henry from the relegated Brentford.

Midfielders - The midfield 3 was pretty regular as Sunjic, Harper and Bellingham played most of the games. Wintle and Johannesson got a bit of game time as well and provide decent cover. Again I don't think there will be much change here. I will need to think about replacements for Johannesson and Bellingham as both are on loan but Johannesson is here until January and Bellingham is here for all of next season so I am in no rush to replace them.

Forwards - This is the area that may require the most work. The regular front 3 was Leko, Redmond and Bailey. I have a decision to make on whether to sign Redmond or not. We have it in the loan deal to sign him for £12mil but he didn't have the greatest second half of the season so I am unsure on whether to go through with it. Leko did well and will likely be the starter on the LW again. The RW is the one that needs the most work. Bailey had an okay season but nothing special. Sanchez looked okay as well but he almost 30, only got 1yr left on his deal and also doesn't fit into our transfer policy. The current idea is to sell him and replace with a better option and then drop Bailey to be the backup. Finding that realistic but quality option is the challenge though.

Player of the Year
Nathan Collins

Collins has been incredible at the back for us and is comfortably our player of the year. The closest challengers were Hause and Leko but both were never going to take it away from Collins. He has been our most consistent performer and his dominance in the air has meant he got 7 goals in the season as well. At only 21, he will be one of the players that the team is built around for the future.

Young Player of the Year
Jude Bellingham

As he is only 21, this could have also gone to Collins but I decided to not give both of them to the same player. Therefore the young player of the year award goes to Jude Bellingham. He has been our most consistent midfielder this season and looked like a seasoned pro. I forgot at times that he is still only 18. I have him on loan again next season so I'm sure he will have another big season for us.
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Pre-Season

It has been a busy pre-season as I had to restructure the entire staff setup (at one point my entire recruitment and physio team was 1 scout and 1 sports scientist) and improve the squad. I had to do this all during a shortened summer as the season is starting earlier due to the World Cup breaking the season up. On to transfers and firstly lets cover those leaving the club. The big sale was Ivan Sanchez who left to joined Dinamo Zagreb in a deal worth up to £14mil. He was 29 and only had 1 year left on his deal so I thought it was best to cash in on him and use the money to fund moves for other players. He has been really good for us but doesn't fit in to our transfer policy so he now leaves. The other deals were much smaller ones. Etheridge joined Derby in a deal worth up to £2.1mil, Cosgrove left next to join Hibernian for £1.9mil and Seddon left for £750k. All 3 were backups and mainly left to free up the wage budget.

On to the incomings then and while there have been a few, the biggest transfer so far hasn't gone through so hopefully I will be able to talk about it in the next post. The first deal of the summer was signing Nathan Redmond on a permanent deal for £12mil. He didn't have the best end of the season but he is a quality forward option that can play in any of the front 3 positions.

The next signing was a cheap one as I brought Connal Trueman back to the club for just £425k. He is a backup goalkeeper that I sold to Man Utd in a previous season but he comes back to be the backup to Sarkic. He wasn't my first choice for this role as I looked at both Butland and Hart for the role but the deals for these 2 were both too much considering the backup goalkeeper barley gets a kick of the ball. Don't expect to see me talk about Trueman too much this season.

The 3rd and final signing for the first team (at the moment) is Rico Henry from Brentford in a deal worth up to £20mil. He was a target last summer but Brentford got promoted with us so he wasn't interested in joining. Brentford ended up going straight back down so he was interested this summer and comes in to be our starting LB. Lowe didn't particularly have a poor season but I feel Henry is a real step up here and probably the best LB around that fits into our transfer policy.

There were 2 more signings but both are youngsters. I've signed two 17yr olds from local rivals Wolves and West Brom that I hope will develop into good players for us. With newgens now starting to come into the game, it is going to be important for me to pick these up early from teams like Villa, Wolves and West Brom. Hopefully these 2 will be the start of a regular pattern of poaching youngsters.

Its at this point I normally give an overview of my tactic and the squad but with so much time left in the transfer window and a big transfer or 2 still waiting to happen, I will leave that for another post.​

 

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July/August

The season starts in style as we dominated a good Leeds side and got a pretty comfortable 2-0 win. They created very little in the game and. if it wasn't for a disallowed goal, Leko would have come away with the match ball.

Another game and another 2-0 win. The big summer signing made his start here and I will talk about him more at the end of the post. He came in at a good time as well as Bellingham has picked up an injury that will keep him out for a month or so. We played well again here and seem to be dominating possession a lot better than we did last season. This will be really tested when we come up against better opposition.

Through to the next round of the cup we go. I didn't realise it was the cup game and so I put out my strongest team. As expected they dominated the game and we came out with a comfortable in. We should have got more goals here to be honest.

This was a really poor performance. We had 10 shots but only 1 on target as we couldn't create anything with substance and then gave away a penalty late on to throw away the 1 point it looked like we were going to take. This reminded me of last season where every now and then we had a poor performance. Hopefully it happens less often this season compared to last.

Back to winning ways and it is another 2-0 win. Both goals were real quality, especially Sunjic's goal who curled the ball into the top right corner from around 30 yards out. It was a special goal and could be a goal of the season contender.

Last game of the season and it as a big derby day. Unfortunately we threw away a lead twice to only draw the game. Collins opened his account and I'm hoping he can get 5-10 goals from set pieces again like he did last season. We played well in the game but couldn't get another goal in the second half to take the points.

Summary

It has been a pretty solid start to the season as we had a few new players to bring in to the squad but they seemed to have settled well and are performing. The only negative from the month is the performance against Wolves where we never seemed to turn up. We had at least one of these every month last season but I'm hoping we can cut them out as the quality in the team grows.

On to transfers then and we made 3 more signings this month. The first one was the biggest as we brought in James Maddison from recently relegated Leicester in a deal worth a massive £52mil. I spent all summer watching him and looking at what was going to happen. While there were teams interested, the best team that was ever interested was probably Wolves so eventually I decided to go in for him and, after a few attempts, I was able to negotiate a deal for him. We have paid £40mil up front while the rest is in instalments. He will bring some real quality to the team while we have him, he has a release clause of £62mil that I think will be taken advantage of pretty quickly if he performs well for us.

The next deal is not one I was planning to make but I made a promise to Maddison when he came in to improve the forwards so I went and signed Tyrese Campbell from Stoke for £8.5mil. His physical stats are very good and he is extremely quick which fits in well with the rest of the front line. His mental stats need a lot of work though so he may suffer with not being the most consistent player. Hopefully he can develop though as he is still only 22 so has a little bit of time to improve.

The last deal was for a holding midfielder as I brought in Sam Field from West Brom for £7mil. He wasn't my first choice as I wanted to sign Max Bird from Derby but Derby asked for £40mil so that was never going to happen. Field still looks like a good option and should provide a better challenge for Sunjic than Wintle has. Wintle will now be the 4th CM behind Bellingham, Harper and Johannesson.

Player of the Month
Nathan Collins

League Table

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