The Opposition View: Birmingham City

07 February 2012 13:53
Dan Anderson answers some questions ahead of tonight's clash.

Is the season going better than you expected? Are Birmingham serious contenders for automatic promotion? Absolutely amazing so far, I think this is our 40th game of the season in all competitions so it's amazing we're doing as well in the league as we are.

February is a big month for us and will go a long way to determining whether we can really push on for automatic promotion, our home form is excellent and we've got 3 more home games to play this month, all of which we should win. When you look at the current situation at Portsmouth, do you worry that the same could happen to your club given the Carson Yeung situation? Definitely. Yeung isn't on trial until November so until then his assets are frozen which means we're relying on a new investor coming in and joining our holding company and putting money in.

By all accounts Peter Pannu has been working hard trying to secure new investment but he's not had much luck. Thankfully the Europa League brought in some good money for us and getting Chelsea away in the FA Cup, on TV, means we'll make enough there to keep going a bit longer. Did you expect Chris Hughton to have such an impact in the first season at St. Andrews? Personally I was very happy when he was appointed but he has surprised me at just how well he's done. There was a point before Christmas when some of his decisions and tactics surprised and annoyed me a bit but apart from that he's been awesome.

He has juggled League and Europe very well, recognising how important the Europa League was to the fans. Completely changed the way we play which is the main thing for all Blues fans, it's been a long time since we played decent football and passed the ball. Who are the key players in your team that Pompey need to be aware of today? Chris Burke is the danger man, been very good this season, he's scored a fair few goals and plenty of assists as well. He was very poor against Southampton so will expect a big improvement from him. If fit then Zigic will obviously be a handful for any defender. For me our best player is Curtis Davies though, absolute rock at the back. What are your team's biggest weaknesses that Pompey could exploit today? I can't really think of any glaring weaknesses to be honest, we lack a left-midfielder which means we can get very narrow depending on who's playing out there.

Spector hasn't been too good at right-back this season but recently he's been very dependable so would be harsh to say him. We don't have a great deal of pace in the side, which is always a worry, especially at the back. After the farce against Southampton on Saturday, do you think the snow will have a major impact on the match? How likely is it that it might be called off? By Sunday evening/Monday morning all the snow had gone, it's still absolutely freezing but the game will be on no problem. Hopefully it'll be a better game tonight, can't be much worse than Saturday's though. Predict the outcome of the game. Portsmouth had the weekend off which will have helped them, but we've coped with playing Saturday + midweek just about all year so don't think that will be a problem for us. We're unbeaten at home and expect that record to still be there afterwards,

2-0 to Blues. Safe journey to all the Portsmouth fans heading up.

Source: FOOTYMAD