Weekend Review- Birmingham City, Samuel Eto'o and Queens Park Rangers

Where better to start than my favorite club, Birmingham City. Disgraceful, there is no better way to describe it. With Lee Clark’s recent sacking, Malcolm Crosby took charge for the upcoming game against Bournemouth. In 139 years, this game was to be our highest ever home defeat. To lose 4-0 is bad, to lose 5-0 is embarrassing and to lose 6-0 is a disaster. You would have to ask the players them selves how they felt about the 8-0 slaughtering in which not a single player showed Championship ability but worst of all, no passion. No fight from the players and no ‘over my dead body’ mentality. Instead, we let them score more and more because who cares how many we concede if we are already beaten? Never mind the team selection or the tactics because it is the players who should be judged. Crosby, thrown into control due to Clark’ dismissal and losing a player after only 7 minutes due to Edgar’s sending off, Crosby would have been helpless with a tactical master class. I have always said that we will not know how good or bad a job Clark did, until he is gone and after that game, it seems we were a little harsh on Clark! Earlier today Garry Rowett was appointed new manager and all we have learnt from Clark’s management and Crosby’s charge, he has an enormous challenge on his hands. 

(Birmingham City fan offers his season ticket to the bench)

A highlight of the week for me was the return to form of Samuel Eto’o. After his time at Chelsea, his career seemed to be drawing to a close. Samuel Eto’o was once one of the greatest strikers around during his time with Barcelona and was in FIFA’s world XI in 2005 and 2006. Getting 33 goals in 67 at Inter was still very impressive before making his move to Russia. When Eto’o arrived at Chelsea there was a big feeling that it would be too late for Eto’o and his finer years had passed before he moved to Russia. After one year at Chelsea he made the switch to Everton. He has put on some fine performances at Everton, particularly against Burnley, where he was very unfortunate to not grab himself a Hat-rick. With his impressive 3 goals in 5 and his recent performances, it begs the question, why was his spell at Chelsea so unsuccessful? It simply wasn’t. Looking at his record it’s extremely confusing as to how his Chelsea career ended so badly. A personal spat where Mourinho questioned the striker’s age led to Eto’o mocking him with his walking stick celebration and was the beginning of the end for Eto’o. Somehow, Eto’o managed to sneak 9 goals in 21 matches right under our noses without us even realizing. Clearly not as good as a younger Eto’o, however still an impressive return. Personally, I am a huge fan of Eto’o and sported Barcelona tops with his name on as a child and I therefore hope his high level of performance continues.

Eto'o celebrates a goal against Liverpool during his short stay at Stamford Bridge

As a Birmingham fan, you can imagine I was feeling pretty distraught about their performance. However, I also take a lot of interest In Queens Park Ranger’s as my Dad supports them, so their victory against Aston Villa was doubly sweet. Villa’s pacey, counter attacking team concerned me before the match, however I was frightened for no good reason. Instead of using their pace advantage to catch QPR on the break, Villa actually had 65% possession. Most of the stats were in Villa’s favor, however they were unable to convert their opportunities and a lackluster Benteke fired wired on numerous occasions. The same cannot be said for QPR and Charlie Austin, who riffled home twice on the night. Bobby Zamora’s recent form has been fantastic and he brought the ball down excellently for Charlie Austin who converted the ball home with a half volley that he managed to steer into the bottom left corner. Charlie Austin’s second goal was on a plate for him, a great ball from Vargas met Austin because of a fantastic run he had made across the near post and enabled him to slot home a second. Rob Green’s performance shouldn’t be over looked either, making a great double save which kept QPR two goals ahead. The whole back four and Rob Green in goal were fantastic but in particular Yun, who played the best I have seen so far for QPR.

Austin, Zamora and Fer celebrate QPR's first goal

A few positives out weighed by a massive negative for me this week. A weekend review will be posted every Monday or Tuesday from now on.