BSAD reports: Ah, Birmingham. Our familiar, if strangely accented, friends. Welcome back, with your song that has fifty-seven verses of proudly but unintelligibly mumbled nonsense. Welcome back, with your fully developed sense of “sleeping giant” superiority that gets you nowhere at all and turns you into Wolves Mk II. Welcome back, with your manager who seems to have a permanent cold and a permanent bad mood to go with it. Really, we’ve missed you.

Tricky one, this. We’ll all look back on it – players, staff, fans – and think, whoa, good side, Birmingham, big test, two-nil, hey, we were sailing along.  Truth to tell, it was mucky work, and anyone with a slightly better memory for detail will always recall that too.

September has only just slipped by but the bookies have effectively closed the betting on the First Division title race. Fulham, nine wins on the bounce, have it sewn up and the others are competing for the minor placings.  That theory, which became more compelling after Jean Tigana’s remarkably consistent team eased their way to victory at Bolton, is a trifle harsh on Watford, who have themselves started as though the season is a sprint and not a marathon.