Birmingham City 2 (Stansfield 22, Tchatchoua OG 36) Wolves 2 (Lopez 3, Krejci 31)
Wolves had to settle for a point away from home on Sunday lunchtime as a pulsating first West Midlands derby with Birmingham City for nine years couldn’t be decided with a winner.
Fer Lopez opened the scoring with Wolves’ first attack of the match and although Jay Stansfield equalised midway through the half, the visitors hit back through Ladislav Krejci’s header. However, Blues secured a point when Jackson Tchatchoua put through his own net in an eventful opening 45 minutes.
Starts don’t get better than what Wolves enjoyed at St Andrew’s. Just three minutes in a loose header in the midfield clicked the Old Gold into gear. Gomes was involved in the infancy, as was Lopez, whose quick feet worked space for Raul Jimenez, who played it wide to Gomes. The Portuguese’s cross into the corridor between the goalkeeper and defence was undefendable and Lopez was steaming in to knock home.
The golden opportunity to double the lead came when a heavy touch by Christoph Klarer was pounced on by Jimenez who set Gomes scampering through, but his effort was kept out by the arm of James Beadle and a clearance from the grateful Klarer.
Birmingham should have then took full advantage when Phil Neumann headed wide from a corner with Jose Sa grounded. Instead, Stansfield brought his side level when he latched on to a Patrick Roberts pass and thumped into the top corner.
It’s never dull with Wolves this season, however. Hugo Bueno’s corner was then met by a clever flick from Andre, which was perfectly in the path of the onrushing Krejci to thump a header past Beadle and restore the advantage.
That lead was to only last five minutes this time however, with Tchatchoua suffering a moment to forget as his back pass to Sa had too much on it and bounced agonisingly over his own line, out of the goalkeeper’s reach.
Half-time | Birmingham 2-2 Wolves
The hosts were the dominant forced during the first half of the second period and Neumann had an effort deflected on to Sa’s crossbar and his defensive partner Klarer headed wide when unmarked from a free-kick as Wolves rode their luck.
Sa then produced comfortable saves to deny Stansfield and Paik Seung-Ho, as Wolves struggled to get themselves going at the other end.
However, the big chance of the half fell the way of the visitors with just three minutes remaining. A long ball over the top was battled for by Lopez and after the Spaniard won possession, he set up Adam Armstrong inside the Blues box, but the forward could only fire over the crossbar with just the keeper to beat.
Birmingham had one final opportunity to snatch all three points with the final kick of the game, but Sa was equal to Marvin Ducksch’s free-kick, before recovering to deny Tomoki Iwata from close range.
Full-time | Birmingham 2-2 Wolves
Birmingham | Beadle, Osyai-Samuel, Neumann, Klarer, Cochrane, Iwata, Paik, Roberts (Vicente 81), Stansfield (Ducksch 81), Millar (Gray 69) (Laird 90+1), Priske (Vazquez 81).
Unused subs | Allsop, Fry, Lund, Fujimoto.
Wolves | Sa, Tchatchoua, Djiga, Krejci, H Bueno, Andre (Traore 87), Munetsi (James 68), Lopez, Gomes (Mane 68), Armstrong (Neave 87), Jimenez (Doyle 76).
Unused subs | Virginia, Konan, Toti, Chirewa.
