Birmingham host Aston Villa in the Championship today.
Steve Bruce, during his time with Birmingham
Ahead of today’s Second City derby, Geoff Horsfield has explained how Steve Bruce motivated his Birmingham City side ahead of their clash with Aston Villa in the Premier League 14 years ago, the Daily Mail reports.
The recently-promoted Blues went into the contest as underdogs despite having home advantage, but claimed the bragging rights in emphatic fashion as they secured a 3-0 win.
Geoff Horsfield celebrating scoring in a later Second City derby
And Horsfield – who sealed the win with the third after Clinton Morrison’s opener and Peter Enckelman’s comical own goal – has explained how Bruce allowed the comments of Villa centre-back Olof Mellberg to be his own team talk in the build-up to the contest.
“The thing that got us worked up for the game was Mellberg’s comments,” he said, as reported by the Mail.
Olof Mellberg
“Mellberg said he’d never heard of Birmingham City before he moved to Villa and that we were a Division One team. Steve Bruce did not have to say many words to us in the dressing room.
“He photocopied the newspaper, put it up on the wall and said, ‘Read what these lads think about you’. He got a pin and went boom. We were so vocal in the tunnel, we won that first game there.”
Bruce is now in charge at Aston Villa
While the fact that Villa were more recently in the top flight would perhaps make them favourites with some, there is no question that no Villa player will be making the kind of comments that Mellberg made back in 2002.
Bruce’s men are still languishing in the bottom-half of the table, while Gary Rowett’s Blues are, once again, in the play-off mix and could move up to fifth with a win.
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