Friday, August 17, at 19:45, Swansea moves on Birmingham City’s ground in the 3rd round of the second English league. Birmingham has a weak season start, while the “swans”, recently relegated from the first echelon, have scored two wins in two matches.
Swansea is on 4th place (goal 3-1) with 6 points, while Birmingham has only one draw in the first two stages. Swansea defeated two remarkable teams, Sheffield United (2-1) and Preston (1-0), but the Black and White game is not very exuberant in the offensive. Birmingham only won a friendly match this summer and, due to the financial embargo imposed on the club, could not improve the batch. In the first round he was almost to beat Norwich, although he did not play convincingly, but Gary Monk’s band (a respected maverick in the Championship) was equalized in overtime: final 2-2.
Birmingham plays defensively against top teams.
Overall, Birmingham looks like a rather limited team and has just lost to Middlesbrough without having great opportunities to score. White-blue builds dangerous dangers and Swansea has the strength to keep Birmingham away from the goal. Basically, when it’s against the promising bands, Birmingham has a defensive attitude and knows it’s hard to dominate technically superior opponents.
Direct games are divided in recent years when the two met in the Cup or in the second league. In the last five games I saw two successes for each camp and a draw 0-0. This time, the game should not surprise us too much. Birmingham would be pleased with a draw, while Swansea will do the same economic game and try to speculate any error committed by the hosts. In case he will score first, Swansea will be hard to return from the road to victory. We are staring at a game with few goals, in which Welsh should dominate the territory, but without registering more than two goals.
THE PROBABLE TEAMS
Birmingham: Trueman – Colin, Morrison, Dean, Pedersen – Jota, N’Doye, Morrison, Maghoma – Adams, Jutkiewicz
Swansea: Nordfeld – Roberts, Van der Hoorn, Rodon, Olsson – Fulton, Celina, M. Carroll – Asoro, McBurnie, McKay
PREDICTION: Both teams to score / YES @ 1.78
