For large spells of the game, it looked like being the perfect birthday present for Mick McCarthy.
Despite all the recent criticism after the Palace battering, Mick dug his stubborn Yorkshire heals in and stuck with the same square pegged 4-1-4-1 formation.
Quality options were the key reason why Birmingham managed to come from behind and snatch a victory. With the game slipping away, Alex McLeish introduced Gardner and Phillips to change the game and Phillips was able to use his little old head to craft two well taken goals.
With Mick’s Sunderland connections, it’s just a shame we have never seen Phillips proven quality in a Wolves shirt and hopefully that will be the last time that he scores against the Wolves.
How frustrating is it that January never saw a natural finisher like Phillips come to the club, it really could have been the difference today.
McCarthy’s options from the bench were not quite as strong as McLeish and although Guedioura had a promising twenty minutes, Mick had nothing in his artillery to change the game back in our favour.
We can all plead with Mick to switch back to 4-4-2 for the visit of Tottenham in midweek, but the unfortunate truth is that after the brilliant Kevin Doyle, every other striker at the club is Championship level at best.
So what’s Mick’s next move? Keep playing players out of position in a stinker of a formation and hope for a point on Wednesday?
Although this was an improved performance and a loss was hard on the lads, we are now entrenched back in the bottom three and on current form it could be a while before we hit that magic 17th spot once again.
@Wolvesblogger 