Alex McLeish's side had a golden chance to take the lead after 56 minutes when DE Jong handled the ball in an aerial challenge with Larsson and conceded a penalty.

But Given was again his side's saviour as he dived away to his left to keep out McFadden's spot-kick.

McFadden's frustration at failing to score boiled over as he was yellow-carded for chopping down De Jong.

Hughes made his first substitution just after the hour when he brought on Stephen Ireland in place of De Jong. Then McLeish took off McFadden and replaced him with Keith Fahey.

Birmingham were still the more threatening, and Cameron Jerome was just wide with a header from Larsson's centre - before Santa Cruz earned a booking for pulling back Fahey.

Santa Cruz earned a booking for pulling back Fahey, before he was replaced by Martin Petrov.

There was a rare threat to the Birmingham goal when Taylor tipped over a Tevez cross shot as Birmingham edged further away from the bottom three.

Ferguson earned his red card after knocking the ball out of Pablo Zabaleta's hands as he attempted to take an injury-time throw.