Wrexham were rolled over by Birmingham City but Phil Parkinson could have made one change that would have benefitted his side.
Phil Parkinson took his Wrexham players to St Andrew’s to take on Birmingham City on Monday night as celebrities David Beckham, Tom Brady and co-owner Rob McElhenney were all in attendance.
McElhenney will have been left stunned after watching Jack Marriott give Wrexham an early lead, although that joy and hope of securing another win was short-lived.
Birmingham rallied back and Jay Stansfield helped to pay some of his hefty transfer fee back with a brace while Tomoki Itawa added a third.
Parkinson dubbed the performance of his players as ‘excellent’ in the opening exchanges but once the Blues assumed dominance, they couldn’t prevent an onslaught of attacks.
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Phil Parkinson could have dropped Elliot Lee vs Birmingham City
Wrexham were torn to shreds through the centre of the pitch and out wide as Parkinson started a midfield trio of George Dobson, Ollie Rathbone and Elliot Lee.
Dobson was the more defensive-minded of the three while Lee and Rathbone were supposed to provide the visitors with some impetus in attack.
Sadly, with Wrexham only boasting 32% of the ball, there were rare opportunities for the attacking prowess of Lee to spring forward and impact the game.
Wrexham expert Rich Fay believes Parkinson could have made the ‘controversial’ decision to drop his star midfielder and instead play George Evans, who would have perhaps added more protection defensively.
Speaking on the Rob Ryan Red podcast, Fay said: “On the rare occasions you do get the ball, you’re missing Andy Cannon or someone like George Evans who caresses the ball, he keeps it, he doesn’t panic, he’s quite calm and good with spreading the play.”
“So you’ve got midfielders who get the ball and just hoof it long because they kind of panicked and they’re under pressure to do so. And I also think, for me, what I would love to have seen, and I know hindsight is very useful now because it could have gone a different way. I would have loved to see George Evans and Dobson together with McLean in midfield, controversial.
“I would play Elliott Lee up top or drop him, and then have Revan and Barnett on the wings.”
Why George Evans would have been useful vs Birmingham City
Evans lost his place in the side to new signing Dobson at the start of this season but after recovering from his injury, perhaps he should have played against Birmingham.
Against such superior opposition, these are the games where Wrexham need an extra layer of protection in front of the defence and Evans would have provided that alongside James McClean and Dobson.
As Fay said above, hindsight is a wonderful thing and making those changes wouldn’t have impacted the outcome of the match however, the visitors would have been harder to break down.
Wrexham instead played into Birmingham’s hands by attempting to launch the ball long to Ollie Palmer when they could have kept possession better and frustrated the hosts.
Parkinson’s side will now want to bounce straight back from this defeat at home to Crawley Town on Saturday.