Championship Round-up

Wolves remain top after their impressive display at the Valley and Birmingham are hanging onto their coat-tails after a fortunate 1-0 victory over plucky Doncaster. They had to do it with 10 men after Nafti was sent off in the first half. 

Then come Preston and Bristol City who both earned 0-0 draws at Coventry City and Cardiff City respectively. The remaining two play-off spots are, unusually, occupied by both of the Sheffield clubs. Short on oxygen, Wednesday are up to fifth after a comfortable home win over Watford. United meanwhile, saved us from being Derby's first win in over a year by going down 2-1 at Pride Park in the late televised game.

Reading were beaten 2-0 at Ipswich and already look like they are finding life in the Championship a struggle away fom the Madjeski Stadium. 

Palace got their first win of the season at Selhurst by beating Swansea 2-0 in a game which sounded very similar to our own against the Swans - they had a lot of possession but couldn't get back into the game. Ben Watson scored for Palace and earned the following compliment from Warnock - "I have no problem with Ben...one or two of his acquaintances I have a problem with, but not Ben." The mind boggles.

Blackpool won their first home game of the season beating Barnsley 1-0 and Norwich got their first away win of the season at Plymouth where Arturo Lupoli scored again in a 2-1 win. Burnley were another side to get their first win of the season by beating Forest 2-1 at the City ground Graham Alexander scoring both, the winner from the penalty spot.

QPR take on Southampton at Loftus Road today and it's hard not to see them going fourth.

The midweek games will help shape the table further as things continue to settle down. Whilst there is an understandable amount of doom and gloom around the Valley at the moment, we should remember that a win yesterday would have put us fourth. We competed well with Wolves in the first half and a second goal when Gray and Varney attacked Sam's cross after the re-start and the game and result could have looked very different. The problem is, of course, that we now have to go and get a result at Doncaster. This will need a battling performance and resilience all over the pitch and we look a bit short at the moment, particularly across the middle. Bailey needs more central support and our wide men need to be present more threat to our opponents. Having said that, if you are going to win away this season, Doncaster is the sort of venue you might expect to be able to take advantage. If we lose again, I can't see us getting anything at Forest on Saturday.