It was a nice sunny day for the first visit to St Andrews of the season.  I turned up at 2.30 to find an enormous queue at the turnstile and an even bigger one at the ticket office.  Fortunately I had bought a ticket in advance but I do hope that getting the same bloke who used to tear your ticket to scan it instead is not the modern turnstile system we were promised.  As for the rest of the ground improvements they were a little hard to judge as the big screen wasn’t there and the undersoil heating was not needed.  The pitch looked OK though.

On to the game I was a bit surprised to see Jerome playing on his own up front and to start with he seemed very isolated and we were unable to put much together going forward.  However as the first half went on Bowyer, Larsson and Fahey started to make runs from midfield and the formation started to work as it should.  It was one of these runs that brought about the best chance of the game as a Fahey shot was brilliantly saved / hit the keeper*.  I didn’t get a great look at it but it seemed a really good chance that perhaps should have been taken.  Bowyer, who had been in the wars a bit earlier, had a good chance just before half time but could only shoot straight at the keeper from a difficult angle.

The second half carried on much in the same vein but was heavily disrupted by the number of substitutions made by both sides.  Maik Taylor replaced Joe Hart at halftime but had just as little to do.  Gijon played a lot of nice looking football but only created one good chance, a shot from outside the area which went narrowly past the top right hand corner of the goal.  Blues didn’t create a lot more in the second half more to do with the poor quality of the final ball than any lack of effort.  O’Connor and Phillips came on which meant a change of formation to two up front.  Then came a sight I thought I would never again see at St Andrews, Gary McSheffrey came on.  A couple more half chances were created but the game ended goalless which at least broke the run of friendly defeats.

Overall not a too bad performance but there is a lot of work to do if we are to be competitive in the Premier League.  Hopefully the missing players will get back as soon as possible.  I don’t think Man Utd will be all that concerned ahead of next week’s game.  On the positive side the trialist Gregory Vignal showed a lot of energy, joining in the attacks but still getting back to do his defensive work.  I definitely think it’s worth signing him up at least on a temporary basis.  It worked with Stephen Carr after all.

Not the most exciting of games but the Spanish fans seemed to enjoy themselves, starting a Mexican wave and joining in with a particular song about our neighbours.  The game reminded me why I seldom watch friendlies but I did at least get to meet a couple more forum members, which was nice.

*delete where appropriate I’m really not sure.