Birmingham City gained a point in Saturday’s 2-2 draw away from home at Loftus Road against QPR which in turn extended The Blues’ unbeaten run in all competitions to 13 matches as Pep Clotet’s men prepare for the visit of Reading to St Andrews this weekend.
This welcome and solid (if not a little stubborn) sequence of results consists of 6 wins and 7 draws overall, while in the Championship, Birmingham continue to make themselves hard to beat and have inched towards safety during this solid run of results as they now enjoy a 10-point cushion above third from bottom club, Middlesbrough.
The draw has featured prominently though as 6 of their unbeaten 10 matches in the Championship have resulted in stalemate and another draw can’t be ruled out at St Andrews when Reading visit.
Indeed, almost a third of Birmingham’s matches in this Championship campaign have ended in draws, and this trend has continued in recent times at St Andrews where Birmingham are unbeaten in their last 4 matches - 3 of which have been draws with Cardiff City, Brentford and Sheffield Wednesday.
Reading recorded a much-needed 2-0 home win against Barnsley at their Madejski Stadium which prevented previous defeats to Leeds United and Wigan Athletic from becoming anything more serious.
However, with just 2 wins out of their last 11 matches overall in the Championship, Reading don’t seem equipped to take all three points in the west midlands this Saturday, especially as only one of these victories were achieved on their travels (3-0 at Sheffield Wednesday).
The Royals had earlier staged something of a recovery when manager, Mark Bowen, took over the reigns at the Berkshire club and this improved run of form also transferred to impressive performances on the road as Reading registered wins at Wigan Athletic, Preston North End and most impressive of all, a 2-1 win at Fulham.
The visitors have since slumped to collecting just 1 further win from their subsequent 5 matches on their travels, which also includes 2 draws at Nottingham Forest and Cardiff City.
To sum up, Birmingham have put together an impressive unbeaten run but the hosts have been unable to convert promising displays to all three points while Reading are capable of picking up a point on the road here but the straight win may be out of reach in this one for the visitors, so this game may fizzle out into another draw.