Birmingham complete bad week for Toon

By Peter Donnelly
August 30 2003

Newcastle put in another mediocre peformance on Saturday afternoon, as Birmingham City came away from St. James' 1-0 winners. David Dunn scored from the rebound of his own penalty after Given let loose the original shot.

Titus Bramble filled in for the injured Woodgtate in defence, with Speed moved to left-back and Griffin coming in at right-back.

In midfiled Sir Bobby stuck with Kieron Dyer and Hugo Viana, with Jermaine Jenas partnering Dyer and Solano completing the 'engine room'.

Upfront Shola Ambeobi partnered Alan Shearer again.

Nothing much happened in the first-half, although Solano was playing well.

In the second-half Gary Speed brought down Damien Johnson in the box and David Dunn stepped up for the pen. Although his shot was saved, Given let the ball loose and Dunn pounced to make it second-time lucky.

Full-time: 0-1.

The bottle to pick the Toon team is clearly not there and I am getting frustrated with that. However, it's only 3 games in and we need to get behind the lads to get them through this spell.

Full match report to follow.