Birmingham City

Image source, Getty Images

Birmingham City manager Chris Davies said he is "absolutely interested" in Jhon Solis after his side's 2-1 win over Bristol City on Saturday.

In their last home game of the season, Solis pounced on a Bristol failure to play out from the back to record his first goal for the Blues and extend their lead to 2-0 with Bristol's Tomi Horvat halving deficit through a penalty late on.

The Colombian midfielder signed for Birmingham on a loan deal from Girona in the January transfer window and is set to return to the La Liga once the Championship concludes next weekend.

"I would absolutely be interested," Davies told BBC Radio WM after the game. "I don't know the exact details of it either, but I know there is a deal there, but we'll have to see what we can do."

In their final game at St. Andrew's for the season, Davies, 41, also reflected on the entire campaign with today's victory meaning Birmingham are now guaranteed a top half place in the table as one of the promoted sides.

"I think our first season back up, we're guaranteed a top half finish now. Can we keep pushing but to guarantee that? I think more importantly, we've got a template now and a team that's growing together that you can go and see being really effective next season.

"I'm feeling really good about the future and what we can do."

Birmingham City will hope to end their season on a high note as they aim to extend their unbeaten run to a fourth game against Bristol City at St Andrew's on Saturday (15:00 BST).

Blues has lost their previous three games before starting an undefeated streak with a victory over Wrexham on 12 April (W2 D1).

However, Bristol City are experiencing the opposite. Having won both their opening games under new boss Roy Hodgson, they have not claimed all three points in any of their previous three (D2 L1).

• Birmingham City haven't conceded a single goal in any of their last three home league games against Bristol City (W2 D1).

• After their 1-0 win in October, Bristol City could record their first league double over Birmingham since the 1992-93 campaign.

• Birmingham won their final home league game in both 2023-24 (1-0 v Norwich) and 2024-25 (4-0 v Mansfield); the Blues last did so three seasons running from 1971-72 to 1973-74.

• Bristol City have lost their final away league game in five of the last six seasons, winning the other 2-0 at QPR in 2022-23.

• Bristol City have avoided defeat in all three of their Championship away games under Roy Hodgson this season (W1 D2); they only avoided defeat in four of his 10 away league games in charge during 1981-82 (W2 D2 L6).

Birmingham City boss Chris Davies told BBC WM he was thoroughly happy with his side's performance in Wednesday's 2-1 Championship win over Preston North End.

"I really liked our start, we played the right type of game, and at that point I thought we could get a third goal and this could be a really great night," Davies said.

"But typical Championship, they score with a corner – soft from our point of view – but in some ways it was good because it livened us up.

"I said to the players that we've had a couple of nice wins here by four goals, playing some fantastic football. This was a different type of game: a battling, fighting game.

"But if you love football, like I do, this is even better. We showed a fight and spirit because to get six points from a side like Preston is a fantastic return because they are a seasoned Championship side. I'm so pleased with the character of our players."

On goalscorer Ibrahim Osman, he added: "Ibrahim was outstanding. He obviously gets the assist for us, and then his goal was the second phase of a corner. He has this one v one skill that once he gets away from you he has got the acceleration, and it is hard to stop him.

"[But] he got a knock and we will possibly miss him this weekend."

Image source, Opta

Birmingham City and Preston North End will look to end on a positive in their final three games of the season despite being out of contention at both ends of the Championship table.

The two sides meet at St Andrew's on Wednesday night (kick-off 19:45 BST) with neither able to finish in a play-off race or be relegated.

Blues have won just one of their past six games (D2 L3) but have at least stayed up following promotion from League One last season.

The Lilywhites had their four-game unbeaten run (W2 D2) ended by a 2-0 home defeat to West Bromwich Albion on Saturday.

• Birmingham have won their past two league games against Preston, and are looking to complete the double over the Lilywhites for the first time since 2000-01.

• Preston have lost 1-0 in their past two league games against Birmingham. They last lost three in a row without scoring against the Blues between 1925 and 1935.

• Birmingham have won 10 of their 21 home league games this season (D8 L3); they last recorded more home league wins in a second tier campaign in 2011-12 (13).

• Preston are looking to win successive away league matches for the second time this season, previously doing so in November/December at Sheffield Wednesday (3-2) and Oxford (2-1).

• Lewis Dobbin has been involved in nine away league goals for Preston this season (4 goals, 5 assists); the last player to reach doubles figures for them in a Championship campaign was Tom Barkhuizen in 2017-18 (11).

Hull City's stuttering form continued last time out when they were beaten 2-1 at Sheffield United.

Despite no wins in their past three league games, the Tigers remain in the Championship play-off places in sixth, four points above seventh-placed Wrexham, but will want to further avoid looking over their shoulder in the home straight.

Birmingham go into this game on the back of a 2-0 win over Wrexham, a result that did their hosts on Saturday a huge favour.

That victory ended Blues' winless run of four games, avoiding a fourth straight defeat in the process.

• Hull have lost just one of their past 11 league games against Birmingham (W6 D4), going down 2-0 at home in October 2022.

• After seven consecutive away league defeats against Hull between 2011 and 2021, Birmingham are now unbeaten in their past two visits (W1 D1).

• Hull are winless in their past three Championship games (D2 L1) – if they fail to win here, it will be their longest run without a league victory under Sergej Jakirovic (4).

• Birmingham have won just 32% of their points in the Championship this season in away matches (18/56); the lowest percentage of any team in 2025-26.

• Oliver McBurnie has scored 14 goals in the Championship this season; the most by a Hull player in a second-tier campaign since Jarrod Bowen in 2019-20 (16).

Birmingham City head coach Chris Davies was full of praise for his Blues players after a convincing win against old rivals Wrexham at St Andrew's.

He told BBC Radio WM: "It was a big day for us. We wanted a big performance and we got that [and] a big result.

"I thought we were thoroughly dominant throughout the match. We looked like a proper team again and got what we deserved, which was a big win.

"I really enjoyed watching the team today, I thought we were excellent throughout.

"When the opposition doesn't have a shot on goal and we had so many chances, that says everything, I think.

"I just like the way we played forward more rather than recycling it."

Image source, Getty Images

The EFL has announced the fixtures for the 2026-27 season will be published at midday on Thursday, 25 June.

The first-round draws for the Carabao Cup and the Vertu Trophy will be made on the same day.

The new season will kick off on the weekend of August 7-9 with the first round of the Carabao Cup, and the opening fixtures in the Championship, League One and League Two will follow a week later on 14-16 August.

The first round of the Vertu Trophy will be played in the week commencing 21 September.

Wrexham will be hoping to return to the Championship play-off places when they visit Birmingham City on Sunday (12:00 BST).

Phil Parkinson's side have a chance to regain sixth place if rivals Southampton fail to win on Saturday.

Blues have proven to be a difficult side to beat for Wrexham in recent history but their fellow promoted club have not risen to the challenge of the Championship quite as they would have liked, losing their past three league games to fall to 16th.

• Since losing their first-ever league meeting with Wrexham in October 1979, Birmingham are now unbeaten in their past six against them (W3 D3).

• All three of Wrexham's league defeats against Birmingham have come in their three visits to St Andrew's, with the Red Dragons conceding 10 goals in the process.

• Birmingham City have picked up just four points in their past eight league games (W1 D1 L6), finding the net just four times in that run. At home, they have lost two of their past four (W1 D1), more than in their previous 41 combined (W29 D11 L1).

• Wrexham have won eight of their 20 away Championship games this season (D7 L5) and are only the third newly promoted side in the past eight seasons to achieve that total, along with Sunderland in the 2022-23 season (11) and Ipswich Town in the 2023-24 campaign (12).

• In the past two seasons, only Finn Azaz (41 - 23 goals, 18 assists) has been involved in more Championship goals than Josh Windass (35 - 25 goals, 10 assists), with the Wrexham man scoring 12 goals and assisting five this season.

Marc Webber
BBC Final Score reporter

Image source, Getty Images

The determined performance by Birmingham City against Ipswich was a mile away from previously poor performances.

Blues fans will, I'm sure, be happy with the grit and guile shown against the promotion-chasing opponents.

They dominated a second-half in a game where a draw should have happened - or even an away win could have happened.

Manager Chris Davies was quick to highlight how proud he was of his side's endeavour after the game.

He made seven changes at the start and it resulted in a different level from Birmingham City to that seen of late.

Ironically some of those who raised the bar in that second-half were the very people left out of the starting 11 after a flat defeat by Blackburn the game before.

As both the play-offs and relegation are equally unlikely for Blues now, all their fans demand is a repeat of the passion and effort shown at Ipswich in the remaining games, to give a ray of hope ahead of the new season.

Image source, Shutterstock

Birmingham City manager Chris Davies claimed the Blues were robbed of at least a point when they had a goal wrongly disallowed in their 2-1 Championship loss at Ipswich Town.

The officials ruled the ball crossed the by-line before Ibrahim Osman's cross went in off Dara O'Shea to leave Davies fuming.

He felt Birmingham deserved at least a draw for their efforts at Portman Road and they pushed Ipswich hard before succumbing to their sixth defeat in eight games.

Davies told BBC Radio WM: "I thought the least we deserved was a point from today's game.

"We scored a legitimate goal and I've never been as frustrated with a refereeing decision in my entire career in football, because of how hard we worked at a place like this to get into that position.

"For a linesman 60 yards away to guess, when actually we now see the ball isn't out of play, is very frustrating because the least we deserved was a point from this game.

"You can see from the reaction of the players that it was in play and it's one person guessing in this whole stadium.

"I asked the linesman straight after the game 'why did you do that?' and he said 'I can assure you the ball was out of play, I wouldn't have given it otherwise'.

"But it wasn't. We've seen that and that is as hard to take as anything because of what we gave in the game and what we deserved."

Birmingham City manager Chris Davies admits his team have lost their confidence after Saturday's 1-0 home defeat to relegation strugglers Blackburn Rovers.

It was a fifth defeat in seven matches, leaving the Blues 11 points adrift of the top six.

"A very disappointing result for us obviously," Davies told BBC WM: "We can't say we did enough to win it. You can see the confidence isn't there.

"Everything that I want from our play - the intensity, the tempo - we don't have enough of that attacking players really firing right now, where they have been earlier in the season.

"What I will say is I don't think its for want of trying. The players are running and working, and giving everything they can which is fundamental, but we're lacking that fundamental confidence.

"After being in such good form after Christmas, we've really hit a period where we're suffering right now, and its up to me to find the answers for it."