However, there is bad and there is downright awful and that pitch at St Andrews yesterday definitely belonged in the second category as it was the main factor in determining what sort of match we saw. I read a criticism of our players on here saying that they were under hitting a lot of passes, but, can you really blame them on that pitch? For me the worst thing about it was that it was impossible to "read" - if the ball constantly shoots off a wet surface or does not run truly because of surface water, professional players are usually good enough to adjust their game accordingly, but yesterday you saw plenty of instances of both happening and so I believe it was well nigh impossible to know with any certainty what sort of weight to put on a pass to a colleague.
It would be easy to say that Birmingham weren't very good yesterday, but, having to play on that surface every other match must be a nightmare for them - games become wars of attrition where strength, fitness and concentration count for more than skill and creativity. I suppose the Birmingham players are able to use a bit of local knowledge about the pitch to have a better idea of how the ball is going to behave in certain areas, but I would say that, overall, their promotion challenge is going to be hindered rather than helped by having to play on that every second match.
As for us, I don't agree with Dave Jones when he says "we totally outplayed, outclassed and out-powered them", but I did think we deserved a draw from the game - we were a bit better than them in the first half and they were a bit better than us after the break. In those conditions, the match was always going to be a tight one and Birmingham got that little bit of luck that we didn't. Birmingham's luck came in the build up to the goal when the ball broke for them a couple of times before falling to the scorer who, on another day, could have been ruled offside (it was hard to judge from the television pictures, but my feeling is that Larrson was, just, onside) and, without that goal, we would not have had to push on for an equaliser which I feel was the main reason why Birmingham had those late chances.
As far as the penalty claim in the first half went, it struck me as one we might have got at Ninian Park, but away sides in general don't get many of those type of decisions going in their favour. In such a close match and in those conditions with chances at a premium, we could have done with a bit of help from the officials, but, Mark Clattenburg apart, they do tend to favour the home side and I reckon it will always be like that.
The fact that it seems to me that all of our best players were defensive ones says it all about yesterday's match - people have already mentioned Kevin McNaughton, but I thought Neil Alexander was faultless and our two centre backs coped well. Further forward it was harder to pick out good performances (although I am baffled by the criticism that McPhail got) and we now seem to be in a phase where the opposing sides in the Steve Thompson debate are over reacting to his every performance.
For what it's worth, I thought Thompson didn't have one of his better games yesterday and that he should have made any arguing about penalties redundant by burying the headed chance that came his way seconds after Chopra went down in the box, but, it's the big picture that you have to look at - Dave Jones has made the decision that we can cope with having a non scoring striker in the line up this year and he can point to the season the team is having as evidence that he has made the right choice. In saying that, you also have to ask who would replace Thompson if he was left out - I argued on here last week that it is still too early for supporters to come to definite conclusions about Byrne and Redan, but the fact that one was an unused sub and the other not even in the sixteen while the raw Matt Green was given fifteen minutes yesterday could suggest that Dave Jones has!
Although they were entirely different types of games, our last two away matches (against sides who have topped the league within the last fortnight) have followed the same pattern with very encouraging first half displays and, justified, claims that we deserved more than a 1-0 defeat - perhaps this shows that we are going to miss out this time around, but, even if our season fades out like it did last year, I reckon they show that we are not too far away at all from being a top four team. If, come the end of the season, we are still a Championship team, I do not believe this side needs too much alteration - it would be good to have three or four arrivals (without the need for the departure of the same number of players as has been the case for too long at the club) and, a way found to get more goals out of the nine outfield players who aren't called Michael Chopra mind!