Birmingham reax

George Caulkin, The Times

And, of course, once Tévez became involved, then City knew they were treading on the securest of territories. This squat pugilist has become an extraordinary talismanic figure for his club, who have won every league match in which he has scored, a statistic that was seldom in jeopardy from the second that he stroked his 38th-minute penalty beyond Maik Taylor.

Graham Chase, Daily Telegraph

Manchester City are building a head of steam in their pursuit of fourth place and Carlos Tévez could not be in better form going into arguably the most important derby for decades.

Ivan Speck, Daily Mail

Against a Birmingham team which has ground out results in parsimonious fashion all season, City were simply rampant once Emmanuel Adebayor had lured Scott Dann into an unwise challenge eight minutes before half-time and the splendid Carlos Tevez gleefully set City free from the penalty spot.

Flowing from left to right and back again, thrusting into space, dropping in behind, this may not have been the safety-first catenaccio upon which Mancini was reared in Italy's Serie A, but it is lapped up at Eastlands.

Sachin Nakrani, The Guardian

Five goals were scored by the hosts and such was the fullness of attacking display that even the full-back Nedum Onuoha was able to contribute to the tally in impressive style, galloping forward as he did on 74 minutesbefore sweeping the ball into the corner of the net to make it 4-1. This win, however, bore the hallmark of City's frontpair. Carlos Tevez and Emmanuel Adebayor were irresistible, scoring twice each and threatening throughout to get more.

Ian Edwards, The Independent

"We want to win for our supporters and for our position in the league table. That is the most important thing," he said. After scoring 14 goals in their last three games confidence could not be higher – even if it goes against Mancini's more pragmatic Italian theories.

At times Birmingham were spellbound by City's movement and pace. "It seemed like they had extra men on the field. That is what good sides can do to you," said Alex McLeish, the Birmingham manager who will not have seen his resolute side capitulate in such a fashion at any stage previously this season. "We did not down tools, but there was some pretty dreadful defending at times," he added.

Birmingham player ratings

Given Made a crucial save with his legs from Keith Fahey at a point in the second half when the game's momentum could have turned. Misjudged one cross but that aside had a quiet and comfortable game. 7

Onuoha Another solid performance at right back. As disappointing as it was to see him miss out on that first goal, his second was a delight. He may not score too many more for us at Eastlands so it meant a lot. 8

Touré Lost James McFadden for Birmingham's goal but that aside this was a confident performance from the captain. 6

Kompany Did not look as comfortable as he usually does under the aerial ball, and there were one or two uncharacteristic slips and miscalculations. But there were some smart moments too. 6

Garrido Could be blamed for Cameron Jerome's goal. Competent aside from that but I'm not desperately keen for him to face up to Luis Antonio Valencia on Saturday. We need Wayne Bridge back. 6

Bellamy Very lively performance: direct running from outside to in caused Birmingham real problems, as shown by his assist for Adebayor's first goal. 7

De Jong Only started due to a late injury for Vieira, he had to avoid a yellow card to be available for the United and Arsenal games. This was easily done: Birmingham didn't get out of their half for the first 45 minutes and the midfield was never really competitive enough for de Jong to have to go into lawnmower mode. 6

Barry Like Given, he has emerged from his mid-season blip at precisely the right time. This was a performance of class and authority - sweeping up in front of de Jong and moving the ball forward with intelligence and precision. 8

Johnson Troubled Birmingham throughout, a mirror image of Bellamy on the left. Tévez's first came from his corner (as did three of our goals last Saturday) and he put in Adebayor for our fifth. Could have scored himself after some Robinho-style stepover abuse. 7

Tévez Excellent, again. When we were looking for a breakthrough he dropped very deep to force the issue, conducting in front of their back four just as well as Stephen Ireland does. Scored twice - a good penalty and a close-range poacher's flick, and could have had a hat-trick. Can put himself in the history books on Saturday. 8

Adebayor Two nicely taken goals for the second consecutive game, but his all-round performance was his best for months. He worked as hard as he has done all season, holding the ball up and linking perfectly with Tévez. 8

Subs:

SWP, RSC, Cunningham - all too late to have a real impact n/a

City 5 - 1 Birmingham

• At this stage of the season it's easily said that results are all that matter, that performances mean nothing. This wasn't how I felt going into the game. Because results and performances cannot be so neatly separated. Against Birmingham we could have won unimpressively - as we did against Wigan last week. But to get anything from our fast-arriving matches with Arsenal and Manchester United we will have to play excellent football. And we won't do that without confidence and momentum. So it was important not just to win today, but to win well. To look like a team that knew they were favourites for fourth, and were quite comfortable with that fact. Only with such a performance could I genuinely expect that the team expected that they'd do it.

• And that was precisely what we got. It was all much more similar to the routing of Burnley last Saturday than I expected. For the first half an hour we played good football in front of Birmingham's stacked banks of four. It was the traditional pattern of a league game at Eastlands: possession, decent passing and hoping that Carlos Tévez would conjure something. But after Phil Dowd awarded us a penalty that Mike Dean would have been proud of, Birmingham just collapsed. For a team with a reputation of organisation and solidity they were strikingly ragged and riddled with errors. 1-0 on 38 minutes became 3-1 just five minutes later.

• After all that excitement the second half was a strange affair. Birmingham decided to venture into our half and fashioned themselves a few half chances. There were glimpses of nervousness, but that was just a Pavlovian reaction to past horrors. We were never going to throw this away, particularly given how open Birmingham were on the break. And we grabbed another two to kill the game, Nedum Onuoha and Emmanuel Adebayor bounding through unchallenged. It was all easier than I feared.

• As easy as Birmingham made it for us, this was one of our better attacking performances for some time. And it was one of the first times this season I've thought that Carlos Tévez and Emmanuel Adebayor could be an effective strikeforce in the long term for City. They linked better than they ever had done before, Adebayor performing excellently as a target man, with Tévez dropping off and operating as a deep-lying craftsman. With Craig Bellamy and Adam Johnson carrying on their Turf Moor tactics of cutting inside to link with Tévez we were livelier than usual and got our rewards.

• And I go into this week more confident about fourth than I have been all season. Even if Spurs beat Arsenal in midweek we will be one point ahead of them with a better goal difference. But I don't think that's going to happen. Liverpool and Aston Villa look drained and distant. I'm giving us a higher than 50% chance of getting fourth now, which is a big move up in my predictions. And our next game is the derby against a deflated United side. We're not favourites for that game - we never are - but we've got a decent chance of another great result.

Birmingham preview

Our first game since our ascension to pole position last weekend. We can no longer tell ourselves that we are anything other than favourites for fourth, or play the low expectations game or deploy the 'typical City' card. This means that the games feel slightly different, particularly at home. We need to beat Birmingham City tomorrow and we are expected to. The problem is that it won't necessarily be that easy. Birmingham are very well organised side who have exceeded their own expectations this season. There are times this season when playing against well organised sides at Eastlands we have struggled to create chances. Fortunately, the quality of Carlos Tévez and Emmanuel Adebayor usually bails us out. But until it does the result looks in the balance and we tense up. That said, under Roberto Mancini we've won home games against Stoke, Blackburn, Portsmouth, Bolton and Wigan, which is better than Mark Hughes in these sorts of matches.

I don't think these stats are always helpful but Birmingham don't have a great record at Eastlands. They've come here for four league games, we've won three and there was one draw. Their last visit was that 1-0 win in October 2007, the last game of Eriksson-era innocent optimism before that illusion-shattering 6-0 thumping we got at Stamford Bridge. The other two wins (3-0 and 4-1) were both under Stuart Pearce in 2005, and included goals by David Sommeil, Bradley Wright-Phillips and two from Antoine Sibierski.

In terms of selection, I'm anticipating just one change from the team that played at Turf Moor. Sylvinho has an injury and so I imagine that Javi Garrido will start. Pablo Zabaleta is still suspended, Micah Richards and Stephen Ireland aren't fit and I guess Nigel de Jong will start on the bench again to ensure his participation in the Manchester United/Arsenal double-header:

It should be enough. Birmingham are good. But we tend to win these games. I'm sure they'll sit deep and defend well. But I just back Tévez to carve something out. I'm going for an uninspiring 2-0.

Suspensions

Pablo Zabaleta's season of bad tackles, late tackles, high tackles, cynical tackles and clumsy tackles has finally caught up with him: he has racked up ten yellow cards and therefore is banned from the Burnley and Birmingham City games.

It's not come at the best possible time, but I'd rather he missed these two games than the next two - Manchester United and Arsenal. The problem is that Nigel de Jong could well sit those out for the same reason. To avoid that, he needs to escape cautions in the next two games - at which point the giant reset button is pressed in Soho Square Wembley Stadium and de Jong can collect bookings with impunity.

But this means that it's probably wisest to rest de Jong for the Burnley and Birmingham games. Hence Gareth Barry's resting on Monday night. Expect to see Barry and Vieira in midfield on Saturday, with the possible addition of Stephen Ireland or even Sylvinho. I don't particularly worry about that game, but the prospect of Lee Bowyer and Barry Ferguson over-running Barry and Vieira on Sunday week is fairly worrying.