Birmingham City manager Lee Bowyer makes no apologies about Blues’ poor disciplinary record

Birmingham City manager Lee Bowyer makes no apologies for the number of cards his team have been on the receiving end of this season adding that others would ‘run over the top’ of them if he did.

George Friend’s red card was the fourth this season received by a Blues player and the third in the last two months alone.

Birmingham currently sit 18th in the Championship table and that’s ironically the same spot they hold in the disciplinary table.

That position excludes cards received in other competitions and still has Blues languishing near the bottom having received 44 yellows and three reds in the league alone to date.

But the boss says it isn’t something that worries him and claims the team would be in a much worse position if they didn’t show their current levels of aggression.

“Obviously the sending offs don’t help,” Bowyer said.

“I think Gary Gardner is one, he was out for about four or five weeks and that’s a long time.

“Then we had covid and had a couple of games called off. Gary didn’t play for about eight weeks.

“But with my team, if I didn’t ask my team to go out there and compete the way we do - we would fall a lot shorter than where we are at the moment.

“Ryan Woods’ tackle, his red card, he has to do that - the fella is running through and they’ll probably go through and score - they broke on us.

“Gary Gardner’s first one, it’s a 50/50 tackle he has to make the tackle and it’s just unfortunate.

“His second one yeah, not acceptable and he got punished for it.

“But no, the players have to compete and if they don’t then teams will just run over the top of us.

“No I won’t change that.”

Due to Friend’s dismissal at the weekend, the centre-back will be unavailable for Saturday’s Championship clash with Preston North End.

Troy Deeney (thigh) and Taylor Richards (ankle) are also confirmed out through injury.

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