I’m going to be honest and say that I didn’t stay until the end for either game.
I managed 84 minutes on Saturday before Dom Ballard’s audacious lob to put the Robins ahead convinced me that I was better off leaving early rather than running for the train; while on Tuesday I only managed until Igor Thiago’s 73rd minute goal made it 5-1 to Brentford.
Both games left me wondering why I had spent money on tickets. It’s not great that the first home game of the season already has me questioning why I had renewed my season ticket and maybe speaks more to my descent into grumpy old age than anything else.
As one can imagine, social media has been toxic as hell. Among the calls to sack Davies, there have been attacks on any and all people at Blues who could possibly be to blame. Every potential misstep made by the club is up for debate and dissection as fans have vented their frustration and bile.
I can’t speak for what’s gone wrong tactically or with players because that’s not my forte – for those I’d recommend reading the excellent work done by Ryan Deeney or Elliott Griffiths.
However, what I think I can do is try to talk about the things internally that people are worrying about, and try to bring some more nuance and balance to the arguments.
The Data Revolution
On July 6, 2025 Blues signed former Japan u20 international Kanya Fujimoto on a Bosman free transfer from Portuguese outfit Gil Vicente. While I don’t remember much about how fans reacted to the signing of Kanya, I can remember being told by people within the club how his capture was one of the most exciting we were to make that summer.
It’s well known that Blues use AI analytics as part of their recruitment process – anyone remember the “million pounds a year in electricity” line from Tom Wagner at the November 2025 Open House?
Kanya was very much the poster boy for what “the data” could unearth. I heard from a few sources within the club how he was the most exciting prospect we’d signed.
And yet, for all this excitement, he just did not play. In his first season with the club he managed just 45 minutes of Championship action in five sub appearances.
As with any player who doesn’t get minutes while the team is struggling, there were questions as to why he didn’t get played. It seemed clear that Davies just didn’t fancy the Japanese attacking midfielder at all.
Fast forward to this summer, and again I hear from people within the club that Kanya has worked hard, got stronger and fitter and that he will be a part of the squad this year.
Now I’m going to once again admit I don’t know shit really when it comes to judging the abilities of footballers but it felt like Tuesday was conclusive proof as to why Kanya does not get starts or even minutes.
Whether Kanya remains a Blues player after the window next week remains to be seen but I don’t think I’m the only one wondering what the heck the data is saying about him.
Now, while I am very biased against the usage of AI on both ethical and sustainability grounds, the nerd in me does like the idea of using data in football. As a fan of baseball which invented its own branch of mathematics (sabermetrics) to judge baseball players, I like the idea of the “moneyball” approach.
It’s not hard to identify teams that have done well with this approach either.
For example. our opponents on Tuesday night Brentford have a long history of using data in their recruitment approach.
The real leaders right now are Brighton and Hove Albion, who seem to have an ungodly knack of buying players which then get snapped up by “bigger teams” like Chelsea for huge profits.
What sets teams like Brighton and Brentford apart from other clubs is the quality of the data they are using.
Most clubs these days use data to some degree and will have software like Wyscout to help build their recruitment lists. If many clubs have access to the same data, then the only way to try to be better than others has to come from the human element – the people analysing data and the people giving players the eyeball test before signing them.
To stand out, it’s imperative to have access to the best data.
Brighton use Jamestown Analytics, who are recognised leaders in their field and currently one of only two teams (possibly three) in the English league system with publicly known access to their data.
I think seeing how clubs like Brighton have operated were part of the reason Knighthead incorporated their own AI company (the imaginatively named Shelby Artificial Intelligence Limited (SAIL)).
Like any financial company, Knighthead use analysis to judge investments and it doesn’t seem coincidental that Blues director and Knighthead senior analyst Kyle Kniesly is also a director of SAIL. With Knighthead head of research Andrew Shannahan also a director of Blues it would make sense that those two were on board to push the data side of things forward.
We’re now deep into our third transfer window since the club was promoted back to the Championship and I understand why there are fans worried that we’re not doing as well as we can from recruitment.
Taking into account the idea that getting 50% of transfers right is doing well for any club, I can’t disagree with people who think recruitment could be better.
With one week of this window left, I’ve personally gone from feeling that we’re two players away from a good window to wondering what the hell we’ve been doing. One of my friends mentioned last week that most captures we’d made this summer were “backups” which had given me food for thought, and Tuesday only seemed to reinforce that fact.
With the benefit of hindsight, last year’s recruitment looks like it was very poor with none of the permanent signings from last summer looking like they’ve offered value for the money paid out in fees and wages.
And yet, when I’ve asked about potential transfers, the responses have essentially been “trust the data”. I’m at a point I’m not sure I can any more.
The Vacuum
Back in April, the vultures were circling for Craig Gardner. While rumours gathered of his impending departure gathered pace on the grapevine, the calls for his dismissal grew louder online.
Although people can point to my confessed bias towards Gardner due to me liking him on a personal basis, I don’t think I was wrong when I was telling people on forums that his departure would not be a panacea. Back then, I opined that replacing Gardner would be difficult and once achieved would still take time for it to properly show an effect on the club.
As it turns out we’re now almost into September – nearly three months after his departure – and Blues have not managed to appoint anyone to a Director of Football / Sporting Director role.
Worse still, the rumours are rife that Academy Director Mike Rigg is either about to or already departed from his role at the club; rumours which have come to me from multiple credible sources and which I do believe despite no official confirmation from St Andrews.
The departure of these senior officials have left many online wondering just who is left to advise Knighthead on football matters – particularly as the calls for Chris Davies to lose his job grow louder.
Whether Davies goes or not, I think it’s reasonable to be concerned that as we head into the last week of the transfer window that the level of football knowledge at the top levels is lower than it has been for some time. After all, how many of us have PTSD from former CEO Ren Xuandong going through favoured agents telling him what to do at a rate of knots?
Thankfully I think we’re as likely to slip into those bad old days as I think Jeremy Dale is to put on a £230 Blues tracksuit and try to stick a penalty past James Beadle at EPIC during first team training.
Yes, there may be vacancies at senior level in the short-term but it does not mean Knighthead will all of a sudden operate in a void of silence when it comes to football matters.
For example, Scott Sellars who was brought in this summer as Senior Pathway to Professional and Under-21s Coach, has extensive experience at senior levels in his career. At Manchester City he rose to head of academy coaching in 2014, and at Wolves he served as head of academy player development, head of academy and finally as technical director before he left in 2022.
I have no doubt Sellars could step into Rigg’s former role on an interim basis, and I’m fairly sure he would be able to offer Knighthead advice and opinions to help their footballing decisions.
I also think Knighthead would make use of connections outside of the club to take soundings on potential incomings – whether it be on a player, coach or senior official level.
In the past Lee Carsley has often been asked for advice and I could see that happening again. There were also rumours that Blues had sought the advice of Dan Ashworth while looking for a DoF and I could quite easily see people of that ilk being asked off the record for their thoughts.
In other areas of the business Knighthead have looked to consultants to fill knowledge gaps when looking to make improvements and it wouldn’t surprise me if they utilised that pathway to help them hire senior staff.
I guess the difference in all this between Knighthead and previous regimes at the club is that Tom Wagner and co appear to have the humility to know when to seek advice along with the sense to get it from multiple places.
And while Knighthead may have lost the trust of some of the more shrill elements of the fanbase, I am still willing to put my faith in them to improve things.
The Future
At the April 2024 Open House, I remember Wagner telling fans that they realised that their mistake was one of timing and of momentum. Rather than allow the Eustace era to continue a bit longer after his last two home victories, they ended it abruptly to bring in Rooney, causing the former Derby and DC United head coach to have exactly zero honeymoon period as Blues boss.
I’ll be honest, my gut feeling going into this year was that Knighthead had committed another error of timing and momentum, this time holding on too long to a coach in Chris Davies that was struggling to get the required performances out of his team.
I wanted to be wrong. I never ever would want Blues to fail just to prove my thinking correct because that goes against anything a fan should want from a club. The Swansea game looked like things could be better, and even though we didn’t lay a finger on Sheffield United we drew an away game we’d undoubtedly have lost last year.
My fear is now that Davies is at a point where he has lost what he wants to do with the team. As Matthew from WAB messaged in our groupchat, it’s as if the “sideways and backwards” chants have got into his head.
When a head coach changes up his style to try to survive in his job, it never ends well.
I can remember Gianfranco Zola switching up what he wanted to do as Blues just couldn’t win under him, and as a result the players looked more lost than ever. Aitor Karanka was left shrugging as to what was going wrong as his tenure ended in failure, while Lee Bowyer sat and moped in a dugout at halftime away at Blackpool as we got thumped 6-1.
With tough games to come against Wrexham at the STōK Cae Ras before home games against Southampton and Wolves at St Andrews in a nine day stretch, it feels like it’s only going to get more difficult for Davies.
I’m a big believer that these days it’s imperative to know who your new manager is going to be before firing the old one. We’ve seen for ourselves the mess it can make having an interim coach and with the Championship looking tougher than ever I don’t want to be in a position of seeing Ben Petty, Scott Sellars or Danny Barham trying to take charge of the team.
Regardless of whether Davies is to go or not, I think it’s imperative that Blues start succession planning and sounding out potential replacements. Even if by some miracle Davies turns things around and we look like world beaters it’s essential that we are prepared for the future.
Indeed, I’ll admit that I’d be disappointed if Blues didn’t have some sorts of ideas already – and not just for negative reasons.
Imagine if we’d torn up the division last year causing Davies to go on the radar of some Premier League team wanting a new young face in to turn around the fortunes; imagine the furore if he’d been picked off and we had to scramble for someone to continue our charge?
Tough times are the true test of leaders. It’s easier to be a good leader when everyone is happy and everything is going swimmingly; when things go to shit and tough decisions need to be made it’s much, much harder.
And while things have been good under Knighthead, at three years in we’re no further ahead of where we were on the pitch despite spending a fair amount of money on players and a million a year on electricity.
Yes, they are far better than the last owners were. That’s a low bar though and we need to be aiming higher.
They’re the ones who have told us about being world class, who have given us high expectations. Now it’s time to show that can be delivered.