Reading 1, Birmingham City 2: Colin Tattum's big match promotion verdict
NEVER has the club anthem sounded more appropriate.
That end of the road, that highway to hell to the Premier League, has finally stopped winding its tortuous, tormenting route.
Blues kept right on, without question, literally to the very last seconds of the regular season and secured top-flight football one weekend short of 12 months since they waved their farewells.
Goals by Keith Fahey and Kevin Phillips produced the necessary victory at the Madejski Stadium yesterday, killing off Reading’s chances.
Sheffield United, 50 miles down the M4 corridor and into south London, couldn’t quite do what they had to. But their 0-0 draw at Crystal Palace didn’t matter; it was what Blues did, promotion was theirs to lose.
Relive the drama from Colin Tattum and Andy Walker's live blog of the game
Pictures from the promotion party: Fans and players
Season in review: Timeline of the season
For the neutrals, the television companies and the Football League, this unprecedented climax to the season couldn’t have been scripted better.
Three teams all with a chance of clinching automatic promotion, going right down to the wire and more? Football heaven.
Throw in a joke goal at Watford for Reading (actually, it should have been a corner) and a soft penalty for Sheffield that brought them victory over Blues at Bramall Lane (sleep a bit better tonight, Lee Mason?), and there was added spice to the 2008-09 finale.
For Blues and their followers, it has been Football Purgatory.
They have threatened to click all along but never actually functioned consistently well to earn themselves any relief from the pressure; pressure from others and from within, either in the stands or the boardroom.
Having passed up the chance of stamping their golden ticket against Preston North End a week last Saturday, Blues walked into the last-chance saloon at the appropriately nicknamed ‘Mad Stad’. It was certainly mad yesterday.
Share
