West Ham v BIRMINGHAM: Alex McLeish forced to tinker as Christian Benitez is sidelined

Birmingham manager Alex McLeish will be forced to change his starting line-up for the first time in 13 Barclays Premier League games for the away clash with West Ham. Striker Christian Benitez is ruled out with the ankle injury suffered in a challenge from Wolves goalkeeper Marcus Hahnemann in the weekend derby at St Andrew's. McLeish has to decide whether to give a rare start to veteran Kevin Phillips, after the 36-year-old came off the substitutes' bench to net twice against Mick McCarthy's side, or to push James McFadden into attack and draft Keith Fahey into the wide left role. Ruled out: Benitez goes down under Hahnemann's challengeDefender Stuart Parnaby is back in the squad after recovering from a back problem. Team (from): Hart, Carr, Johnson, Dann, Ridgewell, Larsson, Ferguson, Bowyer, McFadden, Jerome, Fahey, Taylor, Phillips, Michel, Jervis, Vignal, Gardner, Parnaby. CLICK HERE FOR THE REST OF THE MIDWEEK PREMIER LEAGUE TEAM NEWS   

Source: Daily_Mail