What’s gone wrong for Birmingham and Zola?

Zola has seeked revolution, not evolution – birminghammail.co.uk

The previous man to replace Gary Rowett as a manager was Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink. When the Dutchman took to the Burton Albion dugout in November 2014, it was expected he would turn the promotion-chasing Brewers into an open, expansive outfit.

Instead, he respected the solid foundations that had allowed the club to progress. From there, he slowly added his own personal touches, introducing Nasser El-Khayati and later Mark Duffy for a smattering of skill and flair. It was a perfect transition, just as much about Burton changing Hasselbaink as ‘Jimmy-fication’ of Burton.

The next ex-Chelsea legend to replace Rowett in a hotseat, this time at Birmingham, has been Gianfranco Zola. Despite the controversy that Rowett’s sacking had caused, this blog supported the change, suggesting Zola may have a similar impact to Hasselbaink. Despite Blues’ lofty position at that point, they needed to be better with the ball in open play if they were to have a hope of promotion.

Where the Italian has got things wrong is his demand for revolution, rather than evolution. The centre-back pairing of Michael Morrison and Ryan Shotton, one of the Championship’s best until December, had been broken up within six weeks of Zola’s arrival. He brought in attacking full-backs such as Emilio Nsue and Cheick Keita. Both have shown flashes of promise going forward but are defensively weak and were introduced before Blues had a reliable holding midfielder to plug the gaps.

Such a drastic change in direction can be carried off, but it requires results for fans and players to buy into the new manager’s methods. Zola started his reign with one win in 14 games, many of which consisting of misfortune against strong opposition. After some good build-up, Blues would often hit the woodwork, or a forward such as Lukasz Jutkiewicz would slip at the crucial moment.

The manager is far from the only man responsible for bad results, which were not all down to structural problems. However, unlucky defeats and draws are only tolerable if they are balanced with a handful of big wins in which everything goes right, re-igniting a sense of belief. Birmingham had that to an extent in a 1-0 win over Fulham at the start of February, but that result proved far from the spring-board it was hoped to be.

Another 60 minute period of bar-bashing followed at Sheffield Wednesday but terrible defending meant a 3-0 defeat, before deserved losses against Preston and QPR.

If Gianfranco Zola was to be a success at St Andrews, he needed to combat  political tensions, either by respecting the team’s setup or getting some good results early on, ideally both. The fact he has done neither makes his situation at best precarious and at worst, untenable.