Birmingham City 2 Sunderland 1

Oct 25 2009 by James Hunter, Sunday Sun

Trinidad & Tobago striker Kenwyne Jones recovered after being stretchered off against Liverpool to continue his prolific partnership with Darren Bent up front.

Birmingham had the better of the early exchanges and Sunderland survived a couple of early scares before McFadden brought the first save of the match out of Craig Gordon in the ninth minute with a left-foot strike from the edge of the box after being teed-up by Chucho, but the keeper made an easy save from his Scotland teammate.

Sunderland struggled to create anything in the final third and were grateful to Gordon again in the 26th minute for a good save from Jerome Cameron low at the foot of his right-hand post.

A couple of minutes later it was Richardson to the rescue for Sunderland when Chucho squared the ball across the box low from the left and McFadden met it six yards out, but the defender slid in to make a terrific block and divert the goalbound shot wide.

Gordon made another good stop from Chucho on the half-hour as Birmingham continued to look the more dangerous side.

And in the 37th minute their efforts paid off, when Larsson delivered a pacy free-kick from the left flank and Ridgewell escaped his marker to make a run across the six-yard box and deflect the ball past Gordon with his knee. Sunderland claimed Ridgewell was offside when the free-kick came in and TV replays showed they were right, but the flag stayed down.

Sunderland’s afternoon got worse three minutes into the second half when the Blues doubled their lead.

The Black Cats defence went walkabout as Chucho nonchalantly flicked Larsson’s pass into the path of McFadden and he took Phil Bardsley out of the game by feinting to shoot before turning back onto his right foot and steering the ball into the bottom right-hand corner, past Turner on the line.

Birmingham dominated the second half and could have added to their lead, but Sunderland gave themselves a lifeline eight minutes from time.

Richardson floated a free-kick into the box from the right flank and Turner got to the ball ahead of nervy keeper Joe Hart.

His header may have spun into the net of its own accord, but the hapless Dann’a attempted clearance made sure it went in.

Sunderland pressed for an equaliser and sub Fraizer Campbell headed over from a good position, with Jones heading straight at Hart a couple of minutes later.

The closest they came was when Bent met Reid’s left-wing cross at the far post but his volley went across goal and agonisingly clipped the outside of the post.

There was still time for more drama in injury-time when Chucho chased a long throughball and Gordon came out of his penalty area to try and take the ball on his chest but only succeeded in stopping it with his hand.

Everyone waited for what seemed an automatic red card but referee Martin Atkinson settled for yellow, deciding that Ferdinand had rushed back to cover his goalkeeper.