Birmingham City twice came from behind to earn a West Midlands derby draw with Wolves at St Andrew’s – thanks to a comical Jackson Tchatchoua own goal.
All four goals came before the break as Fer Lopez poked Wolves ahead from close range before Jay Stansfield hammered a controversial first Blues equaliser, Ladislav Krejci’s header restored Wolves’ lead and then came the game’s main talking point.
Tchatchoua miscommunicated with Jose Sa and his backpass floated past his own keeper into the net. And, despite an awful lot more second-half drama, there were astonishingly no further goals.
It was the third successive Championship home draw for unbeaten Blues, who still sit just a point behind Wolves in the fledgling table.
But, once the tension had eased, it was enough to put a smile back on the face of Blues’ American chairman Tom Wagner, who got a wonderful reception back at St Andrew’s for the first time in seven months following the stroke he suffered in February.
Birmingham City fans were delighted to see USA-based chairman Tom Wagner back at a game for the first time since his stroke in FebruarySome local derby games can fail to live up to the pre-match hype and turn out to be a bit of a non-event – but not this one.
Wolves made a dramatic start in only the third minute when Lopez got on the end of a hard, low Rodrigo Gomes cross from the right to touch home from close range – his third goal of the season.
But Blues were level on 22 minutes when Patrick Roberts released Stansfield with a lofted pass over the top from the right and the £15m man went on to blast a superbly struck right-foot shot into the roof of the net.
It did look suspiciously like he might have first brought the ball down with his outstretched left arm. Either way, it was his first goal of the season, long overdue and euphorically received by the raucous home fans.
Nine minutes later, Wolves were back in front when Andre flicked on Hugo Bueno’s left-wing corner and Ladislav Krejci timed his run to bullet home a header.
But the visitors were back in front for only five minutes before calamity intervened.
Wolves defender Jackson Tchatchoua put through his own netThere looked to be absolutely no danger in a hopeful long punt forward as Tchatchoua attempted to knock the ball on the volley to his own goalkeeper Sa from just outside the box.
But he got too good a touch, it was slightly off target, the keeper barely moved and the ball tantalisingly dropped the wrong side of Sa and into his net.
Both sides had chances to win it in a breathless second half, which Blues dominated.
Chiefly Wolves striker Adam Armstrong, who has a great scoring record against Blues down the years but fluffed his lines in the 87th minute after being set up by Lopez.
But it was Blues who had the last chance of all, only for Sa to go full length to keep out sub Marvin Ducksch’s injury-time free-kick.
Stanno the man again
Jay Stansfield’s controversial first goal of the season was his first since 22 April
