Birmingham away. What was the score? 1-1 I came into work this morning and in fact am still here. I couldn't get the commentary on the BBC London site as it kept fading so listened and watched Sky's online Soccer Saturday where Alan Smith's dulcet tones accompanied our game.

It sounded like the first half was pretty pants but the important thing was that we were much more solid and I was pleased that we were frustrating them Bluenoses. Curbs made some changes dropping Rommedahl, Euell and Jeffers to the bench, Murphy & Kish kept their places though. Clearly Bryan Hughes and Talal El-Karkouri (I'm sure I read somewhere that he was a defender?) were installed to provide a much stronger line of defence across the middle and that clearly worked.

Then out of the blue Alan Smith tell's me that we've scored and it's Luke Young again. Sounded like Lisbie could have and should have scored but the ball fell to Young who tapped it in.

Then they went down to 10 men when Damien Johnson got sent off and I wondered if that would wake up St Andrews which it clearly did as Bruce brought on Dwight Yorke and David Dunn and it was Yorke who powered in a header to equalise from a corner.

It was a shame we couldn't hang on with a man advantage but it did seem a huge improvement with another fine performance from Perry, safely back from his kidnapping and Fortune. It was nice also to see Curbs throw on Romm & Euell late on in an effort to make 1 point 3.

According to the Inspector only 600 made the trip, which was about the same that went in '96 (see below) - proving my logic again on the home v away support debate. Nevertheless it sounded like there was a few sore throats on the train back which is good.

Reports from those who were there: All Quiet; cafc.co.uk; Addicks Diary; Sky Sports.
  ¶ 17:00