Birmingham City - Alex McLeish was tempted to bid for Bobby Zamora

Sep 2 2010 by Colin Tattum, Birmingham Mail

"I don’t want to talk about my contract publicly. I don’t think it’s the right place to discuss demands and all that. I’m not going to comment on it.

"This is a great day [transfer deadline day] for Birmingham and that’s what I’m here to talk about - the players."

McLeish stance was in sharp contrast to 24 hours earlier when he told a BRMB Banks’s fans forum that his lawyer would be meeting Pannu imminently to, in all likelihood, bring an end to the episode for once and all, and that he had no intention of leaving.

"We’re really close. I have got a project here. We’ve done a lot on the infrastructure. We’ve invested in some new players. I’ve not thought about abandoning ship, and it’s not a ship that’s sinking, it’s a boat that’s turning in a very positive direction."

"I’m sure we will have good news on that [contract] front very, very soon. Within the next week," he added at the forum, to be broadcast on 1152am Gold on Friday (7pm).

As a former Triad-busting policeman in Hong Kong turned lawyer, Pannu is a renowned straight-talker. And the Chinese owners don’t quite yet understand why McLeish’s contract has always been an issue that has fascinated the media and fans, the more so the longer it goes without an agreement.

McLeish has a year left to run on his present contract and then a 12-month rolling contract kicks in.

Pannu’s comments were not meant to cause deliberate aggravation - the pair’s working relationship is actually good - but being a tad more judicious in what he says and to whom could have helped in this instance as McLeish was certainly piqued.

Blues, meanwhile, received help to secure Hleb’s signature from Barcelona from an unlikely source - Arsene Wenger.

There is much antipathy towards Wenger among fans after the Martin Taylor-Eduardo affair, and a belief that he dislikes Blues.

But the Arsenal manager, and Sir Alex Ferguson, agreed to provide glowing endorsements of Hleb’s class that Blues could put to a UK Borders Agency work permit appeal panel on deadline day.

McLeish and head of football administration Julia Shelton were at Wembley on the morning to plead Blues case.

McLeish said: "Both Sir Alex and Arsene Wenger gave us a headed notepaper endorsement of Hleb’s quality to play in England.

"I think the panel were pretty positive about it anyway. There were people on it with good football knowledge - Alan Mullery, Dave Bassett.

"They knew the guy was a world class player. From a Home Office view, it was does he stop a home grown player getting a chance, an EU player getting a chance?

"The only way it would stop these players getting a chance is if you bring them in to sit on the bench. They have got to be a star and a stick-out. That's the criteria.

"But we had to make sure the panel were aware that Hleb was always a target and it helps when you have got two top managers endorsing a particular player."

Blues initial work permit application was automatically rejected because Hleb’s country Belarus are ranked outside FIFA’s top 70 international sides.