So first off many apologies vis-a-vis the lack of match preview. I was in Dallas, Texas for a rugby tournament all weekend (my team is going to nationals!) and I had so much homework Thursday I couldn't do it (I got an hour and a half of sleep on Thursday). Also I'm aware this is a wee bit late, but I only got home about an hour ago. So ahem, I'm just going to do an overarching sorry. Mooooving right along to the game! You can view the highlights here. Or you can look at these, they're longer and with English commentary but not very good quality. If you watch both of them I'd imagine you can amalgamate a pretty good idea of the match.
So onto real footy talk. Bolton's goal came early, just 10 minutes in. Kevin Davies earned a throw in for Bolton deep in Birmingham territory, which was taken by Ricketts. It was a beautiful long throw in, which went for Kev's head, and he flicked it on to Tamir Cohen who headed it in. It was a nice bit of control from Cohen, who was unmarked. That gives Cohen 3 goals in 4 league appearances, not a bad start at all. Hopefully the Israeli can keep this up!
The first half was pretty much dominated by Birmingham. They put a lot of pressure on our defense and we were lucky not to concede, but McLeish's side lacked finishing finesse. Again our marking of the man was brought into question multiple times (I'm looking at you Knight and Muamba). Gary Cahill however had a stunner, and a certain Italian with glasses was at St. Andrews watching. I'm definitely hopeful for the call up, his form recently has been getting praise from all corners and he deserves it.
When Lee Chung-Yong came on in the 57th minute the game changed. He added some potency to Bolton's attack. The first manifestation of this was a wonderful run forward by Kevin Davies, who received a lovely through ball from Jlloyd Samuel, and he then passed it on to Lee. Lee made a devastation run in the box, losing the keeper and a defender, however by the time he had a chance on goal, the angle proved too difficult. The other sub, Gavin McCann also made a nice run and almost scored.
The Birmingham goal cut open our defense and showed their weakness. All that was needed was a cut back from Phillips and he had a clear shot, couldn't have missed (unless of course he happened to be Elmander). I know I've been repeating this a lot recently, but it really is one of our biggest problems, we need to mark the man. Our defensive marking has been a shambles this whole season and something must be done soon.
Luckily for us however, the three points were not lost. Just a minute and a half after Phillips scored, Matt Taylor fired a free kick, which came off the woodwork. The ball erratically bounced to none other than our very own Lee Chung-Yong, who chipped it to himself ans scored with a lovely bit of control. His parents had flown from South Korea to watch him play, and they got to see his first goal in a Bolton shirt, how cute!
That's all from me, I'm sorry this was a bit of a rush job, but I did on my lunch. Til next time!