Early goals from Radhi Jaidi and Seb Larsson had put Blues in a comfortable position, but hey, this is Birmingham City we're talking about, and like a Ryanair flight, we just don't do comfortable, so the travelling fans were made to sweat in the end.
There's certain phrases that you always associate with certain groups of people; "Would you like fries with that?" with employees of fast food restaurants, "We have to take the positives" with the England cricket team, "Sir, you've had too much to drink and you need to leave now" with bouncers at Walkabout on Broad Street (maybe that's just me?) and "We've got a game in hand" with Blues fans.
With Damien Johnson injured, Steve Bruce made just one change to the sixteen involved against Southampton with Larsson coming in from the cold and taking Johnson's place on the right. Andy/rew Cole was again up front with Nicklas Bendtner whilst the in-form Fabrice Muamba again partnered Stephen Clemence in the heart of midfield - Blues' most successful central midfield duo.
Blues started well enough against a Leicester side absolutely desperate for points for their own cause. Whilst Blues were doing all they could (well, that's debatable) lately to get out of the division, it appeared that Leicester had been too - albeit getting out of the division the wrong end. Nine games without a win before this encounter, and it was obvious that they were even more nervous than Blues.
After about quarter of an hour, Blues were 1-0 up, through the trusty old Gary McSheffrey corner/Radhi Jaidi's big head routine. Muamba won the corner with a good break down the right, and McSheffrey took an inswinging corner. Now, if you're a goalkeeper, the very last thing you want to do is come to claim the ball behind Jaidi - the chances are that if you're jumping for it beyond Jaidi, he'll probably have headed it before it gets to you. Still, the Leicester 'keeper is called Conrad Logan, so he'd probably got more important things to worry about than such trivialities, and so that's exactly what happened, and Jaidi was able to head down into the middle of an unguarded net.
Within 4 minutes Blues had doubled their advantage as Blues broke through Cole down the inside left channel. People (including the man himself and Steve Bruce) commented on his "economical" display against Southampton that was punctuated with moments of class, and that was on show again. Cole showed pace and skill in turning his man and getting into the area where he crossed low across the face of the goal. His ball eluded Bendtner, but Larsson was on hand arriving at the far post to roll the ball into the back of the net to make it 2-0 much to the delight of the travelling fans.
Blues eased off the gas slightly and moreorless coasted through the rest of the first half. Muamba was impressive again, and crossed across the face of the goal after another surge down the right. One worry for Blues though, particularly as half-time neared, was the amount of free-kicks they were conceding around the edge of their area. Martin Taylor was at fault on more than one occasion, as he struggled. I think that now someone's told him to stop playing football and just do the basics, he's really confused in his head (strikes me that it wouldn't take a lot), and he was so tentative it was untrue. Blues defended the free-kicks well enough though and went in 2-0 up at half-time.
Blues had coasted through the second half of the second half (the second quarter of the game, if you want to get all American), but seemed intent on doing so again at the start of the second half/third quarter. Credit to the Leicester fans, who rallied their team somewhat, but it seemed that Blues had settled for two against what was a desperately poor Leicester team with nerves completely shredded, and it let them back into the game. Cole went close twice for Blues - firstly after Muamba had dummied a ball to him that Cole was expecting Muamba to take on, meaning the ball got a bit too under his feet, and then following a quickly taken McSheffrey free-kick when Cole's header was scrambled away.
Those Cole chances aside though, Blues began to toil, and the front two became more isolated as they tired and were able to make less use of the service to them. I'm no football manager, and even if I was, players probably wouldn't listen to me, but I felt sure that after an hour, Blues needed to make a change (or two) up front. They were desperate for it, in fact. Bendtner and Cole were both knackered and their inability to hold the ball up anymore meant that the ball was coming back at Blues, Leicester were getting back into the game, and the constant supply of dangerous free-kicks showed no sign of halting. I say "dangerous free-kicks" - the truth is they were in dangerous positions, but posed little or no threat to Blues when they were taken.
After 70 minutes, it was getting a bit ridiculous that Bruce hadn't taken one of Cole or Bendtner off and brought some fresh legs on up front - an outlet down the channels, such as Jerome, was what Blues were crying out for. After 80 minutes, with Leicester substitutes Geoff Horsfield and Danny Cadamarteri causing Blues problems (by now Colin Doyle had been forced into two stunning saves), it was just pure stupidity not to have made a change - what was the point in not doing so? Sure enough, 82 minutes gone, and with Blues showing as much energy up front as an underground solar panel, Leicester were back in it. Surprise surprise, it was from another free-kick, and Shaun Newton's strike was deflected into the bottom corner of Doyle's net.
Minutes later Jerome came on. Genius. Someone should have thought of that earlier. Blues knocked some balls into the channels and he caused one or two problems. Who'd have thought it, huh? By now though the impetus had been handed well and truly to Leicester who had gone from "nervous, rubbish side" to "confident, still fairly rubbish side, but nonetheless one putting Blues under pressure". Blues managed to see it out, making two more substitutions in injury time to waste time, but the truth is it shouldn't have got that close.
Blues deserved the win for their early dominance, plus the further good chances they created, but they should have made it easier for themselves. Still, Leicester were always going to have to have a go at some point, and so they did. Blues desperately needed three points from this with a tricky local derby at Molineux coming up on Sunday, and they got it, so we should be grateful, and I am. They did alright, would have been nervous themselves, so good on them and all that - it just seemed that some naivety all round nearly cost them. It didn't though, and Blues have got themselves back into a decent position and have to just keep going for three more games now. It'll be tense and it'll be nervy, just like tonight, but if there's three more wins, no one will really care.
Three points at The Crisp Bowl in the bag now... three points at The Custard Bowl really will go down a treat...