Monday Night Football

Bloody Sky, why do we have to play on a monday night what's the point?. . .

Well whatever day of the week it is this is a MUST Win for Blues as Bolton come to town.Blues will be at near enough full strength as most of the injured boys return.

With Dunny, Mario and others returning sadly we are without Mikael Forssell after he strain his thigh in training on Wednesday.

On Forssell's injury -
'It's Sods Law that these things happen and obviously it's a problem, but what can you do?

On Dunny -
'David Dunn is okay though because he's been training and working extremely hard, as have Damien Johnson and Stephen Clemence . On Neil Kilkenny -
'How can I leave Kilkenny out of the team?,He's performed fantastically well and grasped his opportunity.There are big name players pushing for his place now that they're all fit but I can't leave him out, it's as simple as that and he's in the team. He's taken the bull by the horns and done extremely well.

On our position -
'Our situation is that we've got ourselves into a hole. This is the most vital few weeks of my term as Birmingham manager. We have got to get some points on the board to take us into Christmas.We need to address the home form. It has been pretty dismal. We have got three or four games at home coming up which will determine the season.'

David Dunn, Mario Melchiot, Damien Johnson, Stephen Clemence, Nicky Butt and Julian Gray are all available.

But striker Mikael Forssell is sidelined for up to three weeks with a thigh injury sustained in training.

Birmingham (from): Maik Taylor, Melchiot, Cunnigham, Martin Taylor, Upson, Clapham, Tebily, Pennant, Kilkenny, Johnson, Dunn, Izzet, Clemence, Gray, Lazaridis, Jarosik, Heskey, Pandiani, Vaesen.

He seems to fill the crowd with optimism everytime he gets the ball and if he plays then he could be the spark that we need to get the season going.

Henrik Pedersen may return for third-placed Bolton after recovering from an Achilles injury.

Bolton manager Sam Allardyce is monitoring the fitness of Kevin Davies and El-Hadji Diouf.

Bolton (from): Jaaskelainen, O'Brien, N'Gotty, Ben Haim, Gardner, Pedersen, Nakata, Faye, Speed, Giannakopoulos, Davies, Nolan, Walker, Jaidi, Borgetti, Okocha, Diouf, Vaz Te.

Robbed the 3 points from us last season and has been in goalscoring form for Bolton recently, an eye needs to be kept on him.

HEAD TO HEAD TOTALS League: Birmingham 35 wins, Bolton 42, Draws 31 Prem: Birmingham 3 wins, Bolton 2, Draws 1

HEAD TO HEAD at Birmingham League: Birmingham 28 wins, Bolton 12, Draws 14 Prem: Birmingham 2 wins, Bolton 1, Draws 0

# f involved, Emile HESKEY will be making his 50th appearance for Birmingham.
# If named in the 11, David DUNN will be making his 150th career League start.
# Muzzy IZZET needs a double to reach 50 club career goals.
# If he gets a run out, Julian GRAY will be making his 200th club career appearance (Arsenal, Crystal Palace, Cardiff and Birmingham).
# Should he figure, Matthew UPSON will be making his 150th career League appearance.
# If he participates, Damien JOHNSON will play two days after turning 27.

Subject to any late changes, Phil Dowd will be the referee in charge of Blues home game against Bolton Wanderers Monday night.

Blues 1-0 Bolton
A battling performance will be needed and hopefully we'll have enough to get our first home win of the season

Sunderland (A) - Saturday

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