CITY 4 BIRMINGHAM CITY 2

League Division 1

30th January 1982

attendance 28,438

Scorers
City Francis 2, Reeves 2
Birmingham Worthington 2

Ref A Challinor

City Corrigan, Ranson, McDonald, Ryan, Bond, Caton, Kinsey, Reeves, Francis, Hartford, Power – sub Hareide(unused)

Birmingham Wealands, Langan, Dennis, Dillon, Van Den Hauwe, Todd, Curbishley, Evans, Worthington, Broadhurst, Van Mierlo

FROM AN ARTICLE BY GARY JAMES, PUBLISHED IN THE CITY PROGRAMME 15TH SEPTEMBER 2001
… Despite the presence of Francis, John Bond’s City were not quite functioning correctly. Injuries to Francis and Tueart, among others, prevented Bond from fielding a consistent side and the week before this match the Blues were embarrassed by a 3-1 home defeat to Coventry in the FA Cup. Bond lambasted his players, although Francis, Nicky Reid, Tommy Hutchison, and Bond’s son Kevin somehow escaped the rather public criticism.
A relatively poor crowd of 28,000 expected a better performance against Birmingham, and they were not disappointed. After 38 minutes City were comfortably in control. They were 4-0 up with both Trevor Francis and another million pound man Kevin Reeves netting twice. Sadly mistakes by Kevin Bond, perhaps dad John lambasted him afterwards, and Tommy Caton allowed the great
entertainer Frank Worthington to score two before half-time.
The second half was less entertaining, although it’s fair to say each of the three scorers searched desperately for their hat-trick, but the match ended 4-2 and Bond was delighted with the overall performance.