Penalty earns draw for Royals

Forssell: Blues goal

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Teams

• Birmingham City
• Reading

Players

• Mikael Forssell
• Stephen Hunt

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Birmingham and Reading shared the spoils in a game in which both side's needed the win to pull away from the relegation battle.

The draw leaves Birmingham just two points above the drop zone while Reading are just four points clear of trouble.

Mikael Forssell had put the home side ahead after just four minutes, latching on to a Fabrice Muamba header across goal, his right-footed shot too strong for Marcus Hahnemann.

Reading started the brighter after the break and were rewarded with an equaliser after 51 minutes. Mathew Sadler's weak back pass was intercepted by Stephen Hunt who was brought down by Maik Taylor for a penalty.

Hunt converted the penalty with a nicely taken left-footed shot straight down Taylor's goal.

Birmingham had the best chance of grabbing a late winner with a 30-yard in-swinging shot from Gary McSheffrey coming off the crossbar before Forssell's follow-up was also denied by the woodwork.

Opener

Gary McSheffrey's corner was flicked across the face of goal by Fabrice Muamba and, although Nicky Shorey blocked the recalled Forssell's initial header, the Finn bundled the rebound over the line for his third goal of the campaign.

The goal seemed to lift the home side and the confident Forssell twisted and turned to create an opening before having his eventual shot blocked.

Reading were forced to make a change after 27 minutes when midfielder Brynjar Gunnarsson suffered a knee injury and was replaced by Kalifa Cisse.

Hahnemann came to Reading's rescue after 40 minutes when he blocked a low close-range effort from Forssell with his feet.

But it needed Taylor to ensure Blues maintained their advantage at the interval when saving in similar fashion from James Harper.

Penalty

The left-back did not put enough power into his attempted back-pass towards Taylor, who brought down Hunt after he had seized on to the loose ball.

Up stepped Hunt to send the Northern Ireland number one the wrong way from the spot.

Birmingham tried to retaliate and a deep cross from Sebastian Larsson was met by Jerome but he sent his header over the crossbar.

Hahnemann produced a reflex save to keep out Jerome's close-range header from a McSheffrey centre and fisted away a curling Larsson free-kick.

McSheffrey was unfortunate when a 30-yard free-kick rattled against the Reading crossbar. The rebound fell to Larsson whose header was cleared off the line by Sonko, who directed the ball up on to the underside of the crossbar and out.

Reading substitute Shane Long could have snatched victory in the closing stages but he mis-hit his volley when completely unmarked as Steve Coppell's side finished in the ascendancy, with Hunt side-footing a late chance for a second goal wide.