An Incredible Turnaround – The Rowett Revolution

It’s unbelievable to think that this time last year, we were celebrating a last gasp equaliser from Paul Caddis at Bolton to stay up.

This year, we’ve gone there and won fairly comfortably, but even this win was inconceivable in the first few months of the season.

When Gary Rowett left Burton Albion to take the job at Blues, we were 23rd in the league having just been humiliated by Bournemouth. A wave of helplessness swept through the fans, the players, the staff. Relegation looked but a matter of time.

“The players aren’t good enough! A bunch of freebies from lower leagues and some loan players will never be able to compete!” came the cries, and I should admit I had my doubts. The being said, even under Clark, we didn’t usually look massively out of our depth and usually, we could compete for 60 minutes of a game, so it was clear the players had the quality.

Then came Gary Rowett.

Rowett was eloquent, calm, articulate. He exuded professionalism. Suddenly the mood changed amongst the Blues fans, you could feel it, you could feel the tide changing. An impressive draw at Wolves set the tempo, before an unbelievable home win against Watford got the Blues fans believing.

Blues had a plan, finally. The plan was working too. We were scraping points against good sides, and occasionally thumping poor sides – Reading comes to mind. There were problems, the quality maybe wasn’t quite there, as Blues succumbed to Millwall and Blackpool. There were a few grumbles among Blues fans; the counter attacking system was great against good sides, but against poorer teams we struggled.

We weren’t electric, but we were climbing the table. Slowly but surely, we became a midtable side, rather than a League 1 bound side. The signing of Michael Morrison proved inspired, as he marshalled the defence superbly. Robert Tesche drove the team on from midfield, and has been a wonderful signing and it was fitting that he scored the winner that put us into the top 10.

Rowett cut the squad, sending a few fringe players out on loan, freeing up wages to bring in some real quality. Diego Fabbrini came in and instantly lifted the crowd. There was a palpable sense of excitement every time he got the ball. He drifted past players, he created things. It was a shame to see Andrew Shinnie leave the team, after he was instrumental at the start of Rowett’s reign, but I’m sure there will be a time for him again.

With a few games to go, Blues were safe. Whilst that doesn’t seem that impressive, my god it is. Not just that, but Rowett was talking of top 10. Top 10! Outrageous. There was no chance we’d ever get…

Oh.

We’re a few points off.

Still, we’d need a few wins between now and the end of the season, and there are a few teams above us in decent form.

Fast forward a few weeks, and Blues need a win at Bolton to finish top 10. The fact that we went to Bolton needing a win to finish top 10 and not 4th from bottom shows the effect that Rowett has had. We expected at least a point, and we got a win. Robert Tesche, who as previously mentioned has been superb, drilled home the winner and Blues finished 10th – 4 places above Nottingham Forest, Tesche’s parent club.

What an incredible season.

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