Championship Play-off Semi 1st Leg

Birmingham City take on Blackpool tonight in the Championship play-off semi-final first leg and both teams will be looking for a good start at Bloomfield Road.

Blues finished one place and one point ahead of the Seasiders in the league and both sides come together tonight in good form as they search for a place at Wembley Stadium against what is likely to be West Ham United.

Marlon King 'My feeling is if we didn't have Europe and the other cup games that we would have been in the top two.

'But we've got a job to do and it's Blackpool. It's going to be a tough two games and we'll take it from there.'

Ian Holloway 'For part of me it was almost like a dream. It happened so quickly that I didn't really get chance to absorb it.

'I'd love every minute of this if we managed to do it again because I think it was so quick, so fast, so unique. None of us really had time for it to sink in.'

Blackpool defender Craig Cathcart will be absent as he continues to be assessed after suffering heart palpitations.

But striker Roman Bednar could feature after coming through a reserve game following a knee injury.

We all know what he can do.

Nikola Zigic should be back in the side, he has recovered from a knee injury picked up in the game against Reading.

Chris Hughton also hopes to have Jonathan Spector available, after the full-back returned to training this week from having a thigh injury.

Keith Fahey (groin) and Stephen Carr (knee) are getting close to the point of returning, but not quite yet so they will be sitting out this game.

Boaz Myhill remains out with a thumb injury.

Marlon King and Chris Burke are expected to start the game after being rested against Reading.

Always gets in a good performance, player of the season this time around.

This is their 90th meeting since 1897. Blackpool have won 38, Birmingham 32, with 19 drawn.

Birmingham did the double over Blackpool when they were in the Premier League together last season, then they drew 2-2 at Bloomfield Road in November in this season's Championship campaign, and won 3-0 at St Andrews on New Years' Eve.

The Seasiders last beat these opponents 2-0 at second league level in January 2009, but they have never played each other in a play-off setting.

(BBC)

Mark Halsey

Games - 30

Yellow cards - 70

Red cards - 0.

Good start for Blues, they will come away with a slender lead 2-1.

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