'What a cracking start! Clock up some points in those games and then push on from there...'
Well, what folly that now seems to have been...
Let's go back to pre-season; Blues were hammered by Brann Bergen in Norway and beaten by the likes of QPR and Northampton Town on these shores. After the latter two fixtures - in which Blues couldn't muster a goal in 180 minutes against lower league opposition - Steve Bruce was quoted as saying 'I've always hated friendlies. Just wait until the real ball comes out.' Well, that real ball is very much out now, and has been out for a couple of weeks, and it seems Blues are no better than their pre-season form.
The best that could be said of the Fulham performance was that Blues looked rusty. The worst that could be said involved words that probably can't be reproduced on this website. Maik Taylor saved Blues on a number of occasions, and the outfield players just never got going against what is, let's face it, a pretty average side.
So, to the Man City home game, and a great start courtesy of Nicky Butt. Again though, as at Fulham, Blues looked hopelessly off the pace. For 90 minutes Man City players out-muscled and out-paced their opponents. It wasn't even their stronger and quicker players either - Claudio Reyna was able to boss midfield, whilst 34 year old Andy Cole caused havoc with his 'pace' up front.
Over the summer Blues had added various people to their backroom staff, including some super fitness coach from France. Perhaps most of pre-season had been spent with introductions and niceties, because in the first two games of the season, Blues still looked at least 2 weeks off the pace in comparison to their opponents.
And so to the Boro game last night... and if people thought the start of the season had been bad up until then, well good God, they'd seen nothing yet...
Rather than the performance on the pitch though, last night, I think blame needs to be laid wholly at Steve Bruce's door for what can only be described as a laughable team selection. I was in one of the many watering holes around St Andrews when the team news filtered through some 30 minutes before kick-off, and when I say it was laughable, I mean quite literally people were laughing. Until they realised it was serious. I can only imagine the scene was replicated across all the other pubs in the area.
To emphasise my point, consider the four outfield substitutes that Blues selected last night:
Jamie Clapham - Position: Left Back
So, which left back was it that was keeping Clapham out of the starting XI? Stan Lazaridis, the left winger. Yes, he's played left back before for Australia (against Fiji, New Zealand, etc) and for Blues (he's done ok on occasions), but here you had a left back on the bench and played someone out of position instead.
Muzzy Izzet - Position: Central Midfield
Ok, who was in central midfield ahead of Izzet then? Olivier Tebily, the centre half/makeshift right back. Tebily played there with some success 4 years ago in a lower division, and also in a pre-season friendly at Derby, but come on, this was a Premiership game against a UEFA Cup team. Someone else out of position.
Julian Gray - Position: Left Winger
And keeping Gray out of the side on the left wing was...? Yes, Stephen Clemence, chief 'grafting midfielder'. Again, no disrespect to Clemence who has served Blues well and will continue to do so, but he's no more of a left winger than Nico Vaesen is (he's left footed too...) Gray had looked livley in patches against Fulham too, as well as improving even more against Man City, only to be dropped in favour of yet another player out of position.
Mikael Forssell - Position: Striker
So, finally, who was keeping a striker out of the team? Another striker? Of course not... it was a midfielder signed the day before in the form of Jiri Jarosik - so that's another player out of position.
Now, I know that's a simple way of looking at it, and Forssell and Izzet 'aren't fully fit' as we keep being told, etc, etc, but those four players on the bench all had people in the team ahead of them playing very much out of position - especially in some cases.
Personally, whilst Tebily and Clemence looked fairly poor in the first half, I thought the decision to drag them both off at half-time was ridiculous. Here you have two good servants of the football club who you pick out of position, are at no more fault than anyone else out on the pitch, and you take them off after 45 minutes to make them scapegoats. Clemence tried to play as a left winger. Tebily tried to play as a central midfielder. You couldn't fault either of them for effort. In fact, as the half wore on, Tebily started driving the team forwards. I suspect come saturday though, neither will be in the 16 as they're made to pay the price for someone picking them in alien positions.
As for Jiri Jarosik, what must the poor guy think?? Here is an accomplished international midfielder, who has played Champions League football with two different clubs, and has just arrived from the domestic Champions and arguably the best team on the planet. Given our spate of injuries and the like, he could be just the pick up we need in his position of central midfield. Oh no though, Olivier Tebily's going to keep him out of that spot and we're going to play him as a centre forward because, look, he's 6'4" tall! That means we can lump ball after ball at his head, and in doing that he's bound to do something, surely?!
I mean, it doesn't take rocket science, does it? What do we expect him to do? And when that fails and we switch things round at half-time, do we opt to put him in his natural position!? Of course not! Why would we?! We stick him on the left-wing, where his dynamic pace (?) and natural right foot are clearly going to benefit the team.
Jarosik's actually not a bad player, but he was made to look ordinary last night, once again by the team selection.
As I said, what must he be thinking? (Bear with me... I'm nearly done...).
Which brings me to Jarosik's 'strike partner', Walter Pandiani. Now, if as I suspect is the case we're meant to believe that Jarosik was playing 'off' Pandiani, then it means we used 'The Rifle' as a lone striker. Why? Is it his sheer pace in behind defenders in the mould of Andrew Johnson that we used him as that for? Or his powerful hold-up play and aeriel ability like Didier Drogba? I hope not, because neither of those are his game.
Walter Pandiani scored lots of goals for Deportivo La Coruna because he's a good striker and he got good service. He had a good strike partner in Diego Tristan (not dissimilar to Emile Heskey) and had the likes of Djalminha and Juan Carlos Valeron giving him good service. He didn't do it all on his own with his back to goal having the ball fired into him all night. He doesn't look like scoring at the moment, but again, is that his fault? Deportivo were a huge success in Europe with Pandiani spearheading their attack, but it doesn't mean he's automatically capable of doing the same with Birmingham City on his own - it means we have to try and provide him the kind of service he requires, which isn't Kenny Cunningham hitting balls at his head, or Pandiani himself having to drop into Blues' own half to retrieve the ball to run forwards.
Back to last night and the team selection - for a final time. After some 6 weeks of pre-season training, and all the 'We're ready' and 'I'm delighted with my squad' talk, after just 2 games all those plans were ripped up, thrown out and we had some haphazard team selection. Does it mean that Bruce had decided everything he'd worked towards gearing up for the start of the season hadn't worked at all? Are we to expect the same every week now? Has Bruce already lost faith in half the squad?
'Lost the plot' is a phrase that was muttered many times around St Andrews last night, and given what happened, it's hard to disagree. Blues were meant to go 'back to basics', to quote Bruce again. They certainly did that. Everything about them was so basic that a Boro team who hadn't scored all season and had lost on every Premiership visit to St Andrews thusfar were able to turn up and do us 3-0, with ease.
The word 'crisis' is used too much in football, and perhaps it is premature at this stage to use it here, but if things continue it won't be too much longer. As I write this, that magical '40 points' looks an awfully long way off. It looks virtually impossible at the moment. Come saturday too, Blues will face an Albion team still on a crest of a wave after last season, and they'll see Blues in this state and launch at them from the off. Have we really come to the point where we'll all see a point at The Hawthorns as a good result? Because if we get a point, given the current circumstances, it'll be a tremendous result.