Six questions on tomorrow’s opponents which cover each decade since the sixties, I’ll post the answers on here in the morning.
60s. Born in a village just north of a place which has one of the five oldest professional football clubs in the world, this distinctive footballer served his clubs and country with distinction. He would have been called a wing half when he started his first team career with Birmingham at the age of seventeen just as the fifties were coming to an end. He stayed with them until the mid sixties and was part of a trophy winning team before moving on to play beside a river in a place that was once famous for fags. There must have been mixed feelings when he signed for a rival as the new decade dawned, but supporters at his new club never really saw the best of him because of injuries – these got so bad that, apart from a short spell with some non league bucks, he retired from playing at the age of thirty.
Moving into coaching and management, he spent most of his time abroad, winning a national title with a uncouth group of fellows and spending a few years in Australia with sides you may have felt were based in Europe – who am I describing?
70s. North East leaders plus worst toy lead to Birmingham and England midfield man.
80s. Besides City, who he played against Birmingham for during this decade, this man also turned out for Notts County, Stoke, Maidstone and Bournemouth, can you name him?
90s. Starting out close to beaches, this forward moved inland to Birmingham during this decade and there was also a loan move to the Premier League during his time at St Andrews. He had something of a fraught time with some posh, home county types, before returning to his roots where he, eventually, settled in well to become a valued member of a club on the rise. When the time came to leave, he did not go too far and returned to haunt his former side on one occasion – his two appearances for his country led to very differing outcomes, but who is he?
00s. Starting off with a west country version of Arsenal, this forward is now at his thirteenth different professional club having played for teams in three different countries. One of the fairly few times he has come up against City was for Birmingham during this decade – he didn’t score that day (in fact he never scored for Birmingham in his eighteen appearances for them). In 2012, he became one of what is a fairly select group which includes three ex City players, can you name him and them?
10s. Which member of the City squad in the last game between the teams is now playing for Maccabi Haifa?
Answers.
60s. Terry Hennessey was born in Llay, a few miles from Wrexham and was in the Birmingham side that won the League Cup in 1962/63. He signed for Nottingham Forest in 1965 and became their captain in what a successful time for the club before joining Derby in 1970 for £100.000. He only played sixty three times in his three years under Brian Clough’s management before retiring from the pro game in 1973. He then played a few games for Telford, who he then managed for four years before joining up with the Tulsa Roughnecks who he steered to a NASL title in 1983. He later worked in Australia for Melbourne Croatia and Heidelberg.
70s. Tony Towers.
80s. One of the seven games Dave Kevan played for us on when on loan from Notts County was a 1-1 draw with Birmingham at St. Andrews on Halloween night 1989.
90s. Jason Bowen signed for Birmingham from Swansea in 1995 and moved on loan to Southampton in 1997, before signing permanently for Reading later that year. Ostracised there, along with his friend Andy Legg, they both signed for City in 1999 and Bowen was a member of a squad which gained three promotions during his time with us. He moved on to Newport County and scored at Ninian Park for them in an FAW Premier Cup tie which County won on penalties in 2008. Bowen’s two Wales caps came in a 2-1 win over Estonia in 1994 and the dreadful 7-1 loss to the Netherlands in 1996.
00s. Celtic’s Scott Sinclair played for a club called Bath Arsenal in his native city and then signed for Bristol Rovers before moving to Chelsea in 2005. He was loaned out to six different club while at Stamford Bridge, one of which was Birmingham for whom he played in a 1-1 draw against us at St Andrews in January 2009, A successful spell at Swansea led to unproductive spells at Man City and then Aston Villa before he joined his current club in 2016 – in the summer of 2012, he was a member of the Great Britain squad which competed in the London Olympics along with Craig Bellamy, Aaron Ramsey and Steven Caulker.
10s. Yanic Wildschut was an unused sub for City’s 3-2 home win over Birmingham in March 2018.
