Birmingham City might be outsiders in the play-off hunt, but their win against Bristol City last night gave them every excuse to be hopeful.

They scored either side of halftime to bag a 2-1 victory against Lee Johnson's Robins, closing the gap between the two sides to just three points. Bristol have a game in hand, but as we saw with Leeds United that means very little if you're not in form.

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For the Blues, the win was just the latest in a long line of strong performances from a team thriving as an underdog. They were restricted in both transfer windows, unable to bring in the players they wanted thanks to the FFP breaches of previous managers.

That hasn't stopped them pressing into the top ten. last night, Bournemouth loanee Connor Mahoney provide the opening goal, then served up a delicious delivery for defender Michael Morrison to bag the second.

It was a good night for the 30-year-old defender, as our latest spotlight piece proves.

There's a dogged resilience about the Blues, a team spirit that brings all of the players on to another level of performance and Morrison typifies that. The former Cambridge man has served them diligently over a five season period and continues to impress.

Last night he was a behemoth at the back, playing all 90 minutes and scoring once. Whilst his goal separated the sides at the end, his work ion his own area was just as vital.

 

He made no fewer the eight clearances during the game, winning four aerial duels as well. He did what any good defender does, if the ball came near him he kicked it away or headed it away.

He's a centre half first and foremost, but not all of his clearances were hoofs forward. He made four accurate long passes, playing the ball out of defence to set a teammate on an attack. In total he played 17 passes, 64.7% of which were accurate.

It was a good, solid outing for the defender and that bodes well for the critical weeks ahead of the Blues.