Birmingham City and Sunderland Up!
Promotion to the Premiership reward for Steve Bruce and Roy Keane
Birmingham City and Sunderland have gained promotion from the Championship to the Premiership - the clubs have recovered from the disappointment of relegation last season
Birmingham City and Sunderland will be playing Premiership football next season. Derby County’s 2-0 defeat at Crystal Palace has left the two clubs in the automatic promotion positions. It has been an amazing turnaround for the clubs who suffered relegation twelve months ago.
Birmingham City
Both clubs have re-grouped and will be hoping to return to the top flight in a stronger position. Birmingham City retained faith with their manager,Steve Bruce, and even though there were calls for his head during a poor spell of results in the autumn which saw the club eleven points behind the League leaders, the Board held its nerve where Bruce was concerned and they have been rewarded with promotion with one game to play.
Sunderland
There has been an even greater transformation at Sunderland. The north-east club were in a terrible state in the Premiership last season, winning only three games during the season and amassing only fifteen points from thirty eight games. Their manager, Mick McCarthy had been sacked mid-season and his replacement, Kevin Ball was also axed. During the summer, the club was taken over by a consortium headed by the former Sunderland and Republic of Ireland International, Niall Quinn. Quinn was installed as Chairman and manager but when the early season results were poor, starting with five successive defeats, he quickly called upon Roy Keane to take up the manager’s post.
Keane has used all his playing experience at Nottingham Forest and Manchester United to instil a must win attitude into the players and he has been able to call upon experiences gained as a player under the very astute management of Brian Clough and Sir Alex Ferguson. Keane will always be his own man but he has made use of his obvious contacts to strengthen the Sunderland squad by arranging loan deals for players from his previous clubs.
Birmingham and Sunderland have played consistently to get themselves ahead of the pack and home wins at the weekend kept them in prime position. Sunderland enjoyed a close win over Burnley while Birmingham were too strong for Sheffield Wednesday who had been harbouring outside hopes of reaching the play-offs.
The final promotion place will be settled via the play-off games with Derby County certain of their place while West Bromwich Albion, Wolverhampton Wanderers, Southampton, Stoke City and Preston North End all have a chance of a play-off place. Next weekend’s game will be of vital importance to each of these teams future aspirations.
Race to be Champions
Birmingham and Sunderland will be endeavouring to go into the Premiership as Champions. Currently, Birmingham have a one point advantage. Both clubs are away from home in their final games - Birmingham at Preston, one of the clubs contesting the play-off places, while Sunderland travel to Luton Town who are already relegated. Sunderland need to win as Birmingham have the superior goal difference, and hope that Birmingham slip up.
