The third set of fixtures in the Sky Bet Championship in the space of a week begins on Friday night when two teams at opposite ends of the table meet as Birmingham City host QPR at what will be a St Andrews with a positive vibe to it.
That is because despite successive defeats to begin the week, the Blues have made a positive start to the season. The same can’t be said of Rangers, who will desperately want a positive result in this one to close out a busy week.
Where to watch
The match will be shown live and in full on the Sky Football channels with the build-up beginning at 7.30pm ahead of kick off at 8pm.
Birmingham City
Despite successive defeats heading into this game, things are looking up for Birmingham City. We probably shouldn’t hold the two defeats against them as they were both on the road and the first one at Watford looked destined to end 0-0 before Birmingham had a man sent off and surrendered late on. The second defeat was at leaders Preston in midweek which certainly isn’t a shameful result. Prior to that they had collected 11 points from their opening five matches.
There is certainly cause for optimism within the Birmingham fan base. Not only has their start to the season been encouraging on the pitch but they are under new owners off it and they look to be having an impact based on the players the Blues were able to bring in during the summer. Birmingham are unbeaten at home this season and a win here will put a dodgy week behind them and leave them looking up again. If you want to be critical you could argue they need more goals but that might come as players bed in and settle down a little.
QPR
There wasn’t much optimism around QPR outside of London heading into the season and things haven’t really developed how they would have wanted them to since then with a tough start to the season. Gareth Ainsworth and his men find themselves in the bottom five and just four points above the drop at this early stage heading into the weekend so they could do with a positive result from this match.
One thing which might encourage the visitors here is that both of their wins so far this season have come on their travels so they are finding it easier to play away from Loftus Road. In saying that, it will be interesting to see what a relatively young and skinny squad have left in what will be a third match in six days, particularly having played a portion of the first game with 10 men after Jack Colback was sent off. They’ll need everything they have got to come out on top here.
Special Offer
Sign up for a Boylesports account and bet £10 to get up to £20 in free bets! Perfect offer for the Sky Bet Championship! Click the image below for this great offer! New accounts only. 18+ T&Cs apply. Gamble Aware.
Team News
Lee Buchanan can be called upon again for the Blues after he has served his suspension for the red card he picked up in the defeat to Watford. Scott Hogan will be pushing for a recall as John Eustace is set to rotate his side after a busy week.
Lyndon Dykes is pushing for a recall after his return from injury but QPR boss Gareth Ainsworth could give Sinclair Armstrong a rest from the start after a busy period for the youngster. Jack Colback remains suspended after his red card last week.
Betting
If this match had taken place a couple of weeks ago I might have sided with Birmingham City to win it but they have just gone off the boil a little bit and while I really don’t think QPR are anything special, they have got road wins at Middlesbrough and Cardiff on their CV. You wouldn’t say either are hugely standout results in terms of neither opponent doing much in the league but I question just how good Birmingham are. We might only find out here.
Third game in a week and two sides who have become hard to read leads me to taking on one of the side markets where the even money on both teams to score looks worthy of support. I really don’t like QPR defensively and would expect Birmingham to score in this game if they are all they are cracked up to be but the direct style of QPR can be hard to navigate and even if the Blues defence cope with that there is the mercurial talent of Ilias Chair to conjure up some magic. The both teams to score bet has copped in four of the last five Birmingham matches and the three of the last four QPR ones so I’ll take the even money.
Tips
Back Both teams to score for a 3/10 stake at 2.00 with Coral
Copyright secured by Digiprove © 2023
