Blues had this game taken away from them as Owen Coyle’s hoofer’s and chasers pillaged a point aided and abetted by Ref Friend (to whom?). Match of the day pundit Martin Keown tried to suggest that Bolton tried to play football and to illustrate his point showed them passing the ball 5 times after the kick off. I am willing to bet they would be hard pressed to find...

Foster         (6) Badly positioned for the fee-kick equaliser Carr        (6) Getting back to his better self Johnson     (6) Naive against a difficult opponent and crap ref. Dann        (7) Looks assured and nullified Elmander. Ridgewell     (7) Good game becoming consistently good. Larsson     (7) Hard woring and got injured. Hope it’s...

Matt Derbyshire Matt Derbyshire proved to be the difference in this televised Carling Cup ties as little Rochdale embarrassed Blues though much of this rain swept contest. Whenever a Manager of a senior club trots out the old adage about players being given the opportunity to show why they should be in the team you can guarantee the players don’t. Matt Derbyshire...

Matt Derbyshire Taylor        (7) Did his job, no chance with goals Fahey        (5) Not fair to pick him at full-back Johnson     (7) Made the second goal poor passing. Dann        (7) Steady but not dominant. Murphy         (5) Scored but not good defensivly. Mcfadden     (7) Mixed bag first penalty success for nearly a year Bowyer   ...

Ben Foster My legions of fans who read my match report will have noticed a difference to the Blog in as much as it’s done later so I can take a more considered review of the goings on over the weekend’s football. I also can write with the joyous news that a couple of thousand Vile fans are suffering a slow trip back from the North East after getting gubbed...

Foster (9)* - Sensational penalty save along with all round expertise Carr (6) - Solid after last week’s nightmare Johnson (7) - Rock solid defensively. Dann (8) - Polished display good distribution. Ridgewell (7) - Good game didn’t kick the evil Diouf hard enough. Larsson (7) - Worked hard throughout Gardner (8) - Took time to get going but 2 great goals. Ferguson...

In spite of the fact that Blues had to come from two goals down this was a big opportunity missed. Boss Mcleish started off by picking a side which was never likely to create anything and was never going to achieve anything more than a 0-0 score line. Steed Malbranque should have opened the scoring when England hopeful Bent miss-controlled the ball into the Frenchman’s...

My apologies for a late report but thanks to the arrangements of the Bolton Wanderers football club and Lancashire police I was stuck for 90 minutes in the car park and then the M6 traffic. That was swelled  4,200 Blues fans, 5000 Spurs, Stoke and Portsmouth fans and the 25,000 Man U fans going back to London and Essex. Thanks to the fixture computer which practices...

This was supposed to be a celebration of all that’s good about the Blues season. What we saw was a very familiar score line. Blues cannot win by more than one goal and a 2-0 lead which should have been extended to six or seven ended up being halved when Blues’ virtual reserve defence got itself in a mess and conceded late on. Blues to be fair tried very hard to be...

I try very hard not to use words like robbed and deserved or luck when describing my view of football matches. So therefore the fact that Villa won this game with a penalty given by a known incompetent referee will not change that policy. Only the Mad Mick in the home dug out thought the ref was right which puts his opinions of other recent incidents involving his team...