We're back on the road - next stop Birmingham

A win at Ewood is, without doubt, one to savour, but whilst not ever forgetting it we have to move on now to the next game which is of vital importance to us as we look to continue collecting the points towards our ultimate goal.

Things have gone well for us in the last few days. Besides our win all the teams below us have dropped points although Leicester, at the top of the league, marched on last night with another apparently impressive performance.

Managers often say it, and it's true; we can't affect anything anyone else does. We can just smile as Millwall and Bolton restrict Derby to one point, we can smile further as two late goals give Brighton a win over QPR and we can laugh out loud as Little Billy now claims to have approaching fifty players out injured.

Ross Wallace is fit and ready to contribute

Now we must concentrate on our own destiny again and that's a trip to St. Andrew's and a clash with Birmingham, and it's nice to be going there in decent form. Last season we were on a run of four wins without a win and in the previous season we'd lost the three games prior to the midweek fixture there.

Ross Wallace scored one of the goals in the 2-2 draw last season and he's making more and more of an impact as a substitute since returning from knee surgery recently. It was his free kick that led to the first goal and he played a big part in the winner.

He's said it is his best moment as a Burnley player in what is now his fourth season at the club, but he's now ready for tonight's encounter. "I think I'm fully fit now," he said. I've had a fair bit of training under my belt and a few reserve games as well.

"I feel ready to play a part and contribute to the team whether the manager puts me in or coming off the bench. The more minutes I get on the pitch, the better I'll get as the season goes on.

"It's another big important game for us at Birmingham. The fans will still be basking in glory at the minute, but players and staff just move on and prepare for the next game.

"We want to go there, put in a good performance, and get the three points. I always seem to nick a goal at St. Andrew's. The omens are good, so hopefully I can nick another one and get the three points."

Wallace will undoubtedly be in the squad but what are the chances of him starting? I think he might just have to wait a while longer because I think we might just go with the same starting line up as we've done over the last few weeks.

If so our team will be: Tom Heaton, Kieran Trippier, Michael Duff, Jason Shackell, Ben Mee, Scott Arfield, Dean Marney, David Jones, Michael Kightly, Danny Ings, Sam Vokes. Subs: Alex Cisak, Kevin Long, David Edgar, Ross Wallace, Junior Stanislas, Keith Treacy, Ashley Barnes.

Birmingham come into the game in 19th place in the table just ahead of Doncaster on goal difference. Right now they are a reasonably comfortable seven points above the drop zone and they've won just twice since beating Blackburn at Ewood Park on the last weekend of 2013.

Those wins have come at Charlton and more recently at Blackpool and overall their away form has not been too bad. If points were awarded for away wins and draws only they would be ninth in the league with 23 points from 17 games.

However, if the reverse were the case, they would be bottom of the league with only 13 points from their 17 home games and that's something we really need to beware of.

They beat Sheffield Wednesday 4-1 and Millwall 4-0 in successive home games back in September and October but since then the home fans have not had anything to celebrate.

Jesse Lingard scored all four in the first of those wins and he added another in the victory over Millwall. He scored just one more during his loan there and remains their leading goalscorer alongside Lee Novak who scored their last two goals which were in the win at Blackpool.

Birmingham have confirmed that both Albert Rusnak and Tyler Blackett will face late fitness tests while confirming that all of Mitch Hancox, Matt Green, Akwasi Asante and Neal Eardley are ruled out with various injuries. Former Barnsley and Reading midfielder Brian Howard is also out.

Birmingham's team against QPR last Saturday was: Darren Randolph, Jonathan Spector, Will Packwood, Paul Robinson, Paul Caddis, Tom Adeyemi, Emyr Huws, Shane Ferguson (Tyler Blackett), Chris Burke, Nikola Zigic (Federico Macheda), Jordon Ibe (Lee Novak). Subs not used: Colin Doyle, Aaron Martin, Olly Lee, Andy Shinnie.

Last Time We Were There

Our trip to Birmingham last season came just three days before Christmas and we came home with a point from a 2-2 drawn in a game that, but for too many missed chances and a late Birmingham goal, we would have won comfortably.

Sean Dyche made three changes. Both Michael Duff and Chris McCann returned from suspension and replaced Kevin Long and David Edgar, while an injury to Danny Lafferty, already deputising for the injured Ben Mee, meant a game for Joseph Mills.

Danny Ings scored a brilliant first goal of the season

For the first 20 to 25 minutes of this game we played better than we'd done for some time but as the chances came, and they were good ones, they were all missed. The biggest culprit was Martin Paterson who, ahead of the game, had said he needed to start contributing more goals.

But with further misses from Charlie Austin, McCann and Duff you just knew things might go wrong and they did. On the half hour they won a free kick. We cleared it but only to Rob Hall whose cross back in was headed home by Curtis Davis.

The scoreline didn't reflect the game but Birmingham then got the upper hand all the way to half time and only a superb save from Lee Grant kept it to 1-0 at the interval.

We came out for the second half and really took the game to Birmingham and we thought we'd equalised when Austin headed home a Kieran Trippier cross only for referee Eddie Ilderton to award us a free kick for a foul on Trippier after he'd crossed the ball. It was an appalling decision from the referee who more recently had a nightmare in our defeat at Huddersfield.

We weren't to be denied and we turned the game round with two goals in two minutes. The first came via a piece of brilliance from Danny Ings who received a pass from Dean Marney. Ings bamboozled Davis before slipping his shot past Jack Butland for his first goal of the season.

Ings then won us a free kick which Ross Wallace hammered home and at that point you could see nothing other than a Burnley win, but on 89 minutes a slip from Duff let in Nikola Zigic and we had to settle for a point in what I thought, overall, was the best performance so far under Dyche.

The teams were;

Birmingham: Jack Butland, Will Packwood, Curtis Davies, Steven Caldwell, Mitch Hancox, Rob Hall (Wade Elliott 76), Callum Reilly, Hayden Mullins, Ravel Morrison (Chris Burke 71), Nathan Redmond, Nikola Zigic. Subs not used: Colin Doyle, Pablo , Emmitt Delfouneso, Morgaro Gomis, Josh Hawker.

Burnley: Lee Grant, Kieran Trippier, Michael Duff, Jason Shackell, Joseph Mills, Dean Marney (Sam Vokes 90+3), Chris McCann, Ross Wallace, Danny Ings (Marvin Bartley 88), Martin Paterson (Keith Treacy 63). Subs not used: Brian Jensen, David Edgar, Kevin Long, Junior Stanislas.

Previous Games against Birmingham

Click HERE to see all previous results against Birmingham