Bolton Wanderers v Birmingham City - as it happened

Anyway, welcome. Let's get this going, shall we? Preamble: I've been in France for a couple of weeks. Lovely, thanks for asking. Bit hot for my liking at times, but lovely all the same. Bustling markets and lake swimming, that's what it was all about. Yesterday lunchtime I was in Apt, the Luberon market-town, buying my mother some fig vinegar (you've got to get her something, don't you?) and some astonishingly expensive nougat. Got the Eurostar back, arrived about 11pm last night. The 20 minutes of Match of the Day I watched before collapsing constitute the sum of the Premier League football I have seen so far this season. Those of you who come here for informed opinion should be reassured that I've seen a lot of football in other seasons, but this one's a stranger to me. I thought I'd be a bit behind the times when I got back, but to find Edgar Davids playing for Crystal Palace and people talking about Johan Elmander's goalscoring prowess was still a bit of a shock. I'm told Bolton are a lot of fun to watch these days. Either of these teams could go second today, if they go a bit goal crazy. I'm really looking forward to this one, as it goes. 1.05pm: Would you like the teams? Here are the teams: Bolton: Jaaskelainen, Steinsson, Cahill, Knight, Robinson, Lee, Holden, Muamba, Petrov, Elmander, Kevin Davies. Subs: Bogdan, Taylor, Mark Davies, Ricketts, Blake, Alonso, Andrew O'Brien. Birmingham: Foster, Carr, Johnson, Dann, Ridgewell, Larsson, Gardner, Ferguson, McFadden, Bowyer, Jerome. Subs: Taylor, Murphy, O'Connor, Derbyshire, Fahey, Zigic, Valles. Referee: Kevin Friend (Leicestershire). 1.26pm: So kick-off moments away. Bolton are unchanged, Birmingham have replaced Zigic with Bowyer. Players gathering backstage. 1.28pm: And they're out! Bolton's players look very thirsty – all but two are drinking from their personal energy-drink bottles as they take to the field. 1 min: Peeeeeep! They're off! 2 mins: A scary metal spike is discovered in the centre circle and removed by the referee. Sounds to me like a cheap way to add steel to your midfield. GOAL! Bolton 0 Birmingham 1 (Johnson, 4) A lovely reverse pass from McFadden releases Bowyer down the left side of Bolton's penalty area. His low cross comes off Jerome and bobbles to Johnson – who came up for a free kick a minute or so earlier and seemed in no hurry to return to defence – who slides in his first goal for the club. 6 mins: Chance for Bolton. Ah, and this is the new style I've heard so much about – big welly from Jaaskelainen, flick-on from Davies, first-time shot from Elmander wide of the near post. 10 mins: It's not just the goal – Birmingham have started brightly here, and that McFadden pass/Bowyer run in the build-up was rather fine. The action's all a bit compressed down Birmingham's left flank, between the halfway line and the edge of Bolton's penalty area. 11 mins: A chance for Bolton that Sky's cameras almost miss. A mistake by Stephen Carr, I'm told – not his first of the season – leading to a shot from Petrov, blocked by the recovering Carr. 19 mins: Bolton have finally settled, but as yet it's all stereotypical Bolton stuff – a long-ball to Kevin Davies, a chest-down, a deflected shot from distance. 21 min: Birmingham get a free-kick from that left-wing, which ends with the ball falling to Jerome, who falls just as he's about to strike his shot. He demands a penalty, though no one else can see why. Bolton break and win a free-kick of their own, which Holden sends goalwards and Foster flaps over. 28 mins: I've got to say I'm not seeing anything genuinely promising from Bolton. Sure, they might score from a set-piece or a Davies knock-down, but in open play there's very little poise or creativity. Martin Petrov, who I suppose is intended to provide both, hasn't turned up. 33 mins: Birmingham seem content, given their lead, for this to be a stuttering, niggly game. In the last 10 minutes they can't have retained possession for more than 20 seconds at a stretch. In their latest attack Bolton win a corner which reaches Cahill, 16 yards out. His backheel sets up Petrov, whose shot deflects to Davies, whose chipped cross glances off Knight's head to Elmander, who air-kicks. 35 mins: Gardner breaks for Birmingham down the right, but with McFadden and (I think) Bowyer unmarked in the middle his cross is weak and too high, and McFadden's volley too close to Jaaskelainen. 37 mins: RED CARD! Jussi Jaaskelainen is off! Moment of mad drama! Roger Johnson challenges the Bolton keeper for the ball. Not particularly violently, but he probably shouldn't have bothered – the ball was clearly in the keeper's arms. As they get up, Johnson appears to apologise and Jaaskelainen slaps him full across the face. 38 mins: Johnson gets booked, though I can't be sure why. There appeared to be quite a bit of post-red-card jiggerpokery out there. Bolton will bring on their substitute goalkeeper, Adam Bogdan, for his Premier League debut for Martin Petrov, who is furious about coming off, and indeed everything else. 41 mins: Bogdan, who curiously wears No1, has previously played one league game, on loan at Crewe against Bury last September. Crewe lost 3-2. 43 mins: Holden, probably Bolton's best midfielder, creates a shooting opportunity for himself, the ball deflecting wide for another corner. 45 mins: Three minutes' stoppage time to be played here. 45+2 mins: I'm not entirely sure, watching the replays of the sending-off incident, that Johnson was actually apologising. There appeared to be a very mildly aggressive push into Jaaskelainen's chest before the slap. Still, a bizarre response from such an experienced player. Half-time: It's half-time. The game has not lived up to any of my pre-match optimism, despite the early goal. The fans boo. The players strutt and strop. It has all been a bit ugly. The other question, voiced by Richard Keys – given that the ball was in play when Johnson was slapped, why didn't Birmingham get a penalty? Unrelated news: Bologna have sacked their coach a day before their first Serie A game for being "too sceptical about the team's chances". This is funny, no? And that red card debate didn't last long – the referee waved play on after Johnson's challenge as as Jaaskelainen had the ball and Bolton thus had the advantage. As soon as Jaaskelainen started slapping people they lost the advantage and play was brought back for the free-kick. 46 mins: Peeeeep! They're off! Again! 46 mins: No changes to either side at the break. Personally, I'd have changed both sides, probably for Barcelona and Brazil circa 1982. GOAL! Bolton 0 Birmingham 2 (Gardner, 51 min) McFadden chips the ball in, Jerome cleverly knocks it across goal rather than trying to score and Gardner controls and scores with a slight air of panic. Bolton are sure that Jerome was offside, but replays suggest he was level. 54 mins: Having not seen a single moment of Bolton so far this season but having read a bit about how great they are these days, I am frankly astonished at today's display, which has to be one of the worst I have seen from them in the last decade. And as I type, they work their best chance of the match – Lee, touching the ball for the second time all game, passes into the area and Elmander spins and shoots too close to Foster. 58 mins: Lee, getting into this whole football lark now, wriggles past three players, gets a bit excited and gives the ball away trying to wriggle past a fourth. Bolton, though, are half-heartedly on top at present. 62 mins: Davies blasts over from 25 yards. "It all opened up for him," expert-summarises Alan Smith, "might have hindered him a little bit actually." Eh? 63 mins: Bolton just didn't score and I'm still not sure how. Steinsson appeared to be about to turn the ball into an empty net from a yard out, but then he didn't. 64 mins: Ah, I see what happened – he was Bowyered off the ball. Bolton took a corner from their right wing, which was flicked on at the near post towards Steinsson. The ball seemed to spin slightly away from goal at the last minute, by which time Bowyer had his opponent by the shirt and was busy pushing him over. No goal, then. 67 mins: Robbie Blake comes on for Johan Elmander, against one of his former clubs. Matt Derbyshire, meanwhile, replaces McFadden for Birmingham. 70 min: PENALTY! Bolton win a spot-kick! Robinson scoops the ball into the penalty area from inside his own half, Davies goes down under Johnson's challenge and Kevin Friend points to the spot... GOAL! Bolton 1 Birmingham 2 (Davies 71pen) And that's a lovely penalty, lashed into the roof of the net with the goalkeeper going the wrong way. 72 mins: Larsson gets booked for tripping Holden. Birmingham rattled. Still rattled, really. They were a bit rattled even before the penalty. 74 mins: Larsson is now rolling around, clutching his right knee, apparently in genuine pain after a (fair) challenge from Davies. 76 mins: Larsson is fit enough to limp off the pitch but not to play on – Keith Fahey replaces him. 78 mins: Bolton bring on Mark Davies to replace Stuart Holden. This has become an even (but really quite poor and dispiriting) game now. GOAL! Bolton 2 Birmingham 2 (Blake 81 mins) A lovely free-kick from Blake, curled right into the top right corner of Ben Foster's goal – would probably have gone in even if the keeper hadn't taken a step in the wrong direction just before the ball was hit. 82 mins: This will look like a heroic comeback from Bolton, and obviously to come back from two goals and a man down is at worst very impressive indeed. But they've scored a penalty and a free-kick, and created next to nothing from open play. Birmingham meanwhile have never looked as bright as they did in the first 10 minutes. It's quite puzzling how they can outfight 11 men only to be undone by 10. 87 mins: Fahey gives the ball away to Kevin Davies in Birmingham's penalty area, but Bolton's skipper lashes his shot wide. 88 mins: Cameron Jerome thrashes a panicked clearance into touch from inside his own penalty area. Will Bolton go for the win here? 90 mins: Five minutes' stoppage time signalled. Five! 90+1 mins: Bowyer plays in Jerome, Birmingham's best chance of the half by a very big distance, but the shot is along the ground and hits Bogdan's legs. 90+3 mins: Birmingham win their first corner of the match. Johnson heads the ball well over the bar. Final whistle: Two unbeaten teams, but only one will be celebrating this point. Bolton, booed off the pitch at half-time, are cheered to the rafters by a far-from-full Reebok. They could easily have folded here at 2-0, and credit to them for keeping up the fight and earning their reward. But this was not the most thrilling four-goal, red-card-splattered draw. And how Birmingham allowed a rookie goalkeeper making his first appearance at this level go until stoppage-time before making a save is beyond me. Anyway, that's one football match over. Happily, there's about to be another one. Do join me for Aston Villa v Everton , if you've got a moment.