Ipswich Town and Birmingham City heading for stalemate

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Ipswich Town still remain bottom of the Championship following their recent 2-0 defeat away at Brentford during the week which has left Paul Lambert’s side 14 points adrift of fourth from bottom club, Wigan Athletic, and safety ahead of their clash with Birmingham City this Saturday afternoon.

With just three defeats out of their last 10 matches in the Championship, Ipswich have shown a glimmer of hope of staging a late and miraculous attempt at survival as the Tractor Boys have picked up useful points in draws with Derby County, Stoke City, Wigan Athletic, West Brom, Bristol City and Nottingham Forest as well as a desperately needed 2-1 win away at Bolton Wanderers.

However, the hosts have managed to scrape just two wins at Portman Road all season which were gained over Wigan Athletic and Rotherham United but they head into Saturday’s clash with Birmingham City without a win from their last six matches on home soil.

In addition, Ipswich have drawn 10 of their 20 home matches to date at Portman Road.

Birmingham City gained an extremely valuable four points from their last two matches in the Championship which were made even more impressive by the fact that they played 2nd placed Leeds United (who they beat 1-0) and 3rd placed Sheffield United (drew 1-1), with both results gained at St Andrews.

Birmingham have now done ‘the double’ against Leeds United and the recent 9-point deduction handed down by the Football League certainly seems to have galvanised Gary Monk’s squad as they edge closer to Championship survival.

The visitors still remain in the bottom half of the Championship in 17th place but their ‘real’ position would have been 15th had it not been for the penalty. As it is, The Blues now hold a fairly comfortable looking six point cushion ahead of third from bottom club, Rotherham United, and they’ll be hoping that Stoke City can do them a favour by beating The Millers on Saturday.

Birmingham may well need the favour too, as the visitors have lost their last three away matches on the trot on their travels with losses at Hull City, Preston North End and West Brom, but manager Gary Monk will be hoping that his side draw some inspiration from taking four points off two of the top three clubs in recent matches here.

With neither side in great form in their respective home and away matches in recent weeks, this looks like being another draw.