Chris Davies feels Birmingham ‘deserve’ to be second after Millwall win
Blues have won six of their last eight games and are unbeaten at home in the league.
Birmingham manager Chris Davies insisted his side deserve to be second in the Championship after beating Millwall 3-0 at St. Andrew’s @ Knighthead Park.
Alex Cochrane’s 30-yarder inside a minute was followed by fellow left-footed first-half strikes from Max Bird, on his full City debut, and Jay Stansfield to ease the loss of seven-goal striker August Priske with a knee problem.
It put City on their way to their sixth win in eight and extended their unbeaten Championship home start to seven games.
Davies said: “We are in a position we deserve to be in. Sometimes you go into a false position and we snuck in.
“But we have earned it with our performances and the way the team looks. We’ve got to enjoy it and take belief and confidence from it. We have made good strides so far.”
Reflecting on the game, Davies added: “It was a big win against a very good opponent. We made a perfect start scoring inside the first minute.
“I wanted us to continue with the same fight, organisation and physicality and with the ball try to be as fluid as we could and there was a lot to like in the first half.”
Cochrane lashed home a loose ball from 30 yards when Phil Neumann’s shot hit a defender.
Bird doubled the lead in the 16th minute, steering home a left-footed drive from 15 yards after sidestepping Derek Mazou-Sacko, and Blues made it 3-0 with a fine breakaway goal in the 29th minute.
Stansfield took Bird’s pass before cutting inside Jake Cooper and firing left-footed through Caleb Taylor’s legs into the bottom corner from just outside the box.
Millwall’s closest effort was Camiel Neghli’s thunderous shot that shook the crossbar while substitute Carlos Vicente hit a post as City chased a fourth goal.
Millwall head coach Alex Neil said: “We conceded in the first minute, then we had an opportunity to equalise but Kyrell Lisbie put it over the bar. We went gung-ho looking for an equaliser and got hit by a sucker punch.
“They broke up the pitch and scored from outside the box and then we got another opportunity to score and didn’t take it. They then broke again and scored the third goal. The game was done at 3-0.
“I thought it wasn’t just a case of ‘we missed, they scored’ but after the first goal, we lacked discipline in the middle of the pitch. The space in front of the two centre-backs was too vacant.
“We needed to be more clinical in the final third, stop the transition and, in two-versus-one situations, make the extra man count.”