Birmingham City beat Millwall to clinch first win since August

Birmingham City picked up all three points at The Den tonight as they beat Millwall 3-1 to register their first victory in eight attempts.

Millwall raced out of the blocks and within the first couple of minutes Scott McDonald flashed a shot wide before Mathias Ranegie nodded just over the bar.

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Ranegie then came even closer to opening the scoring as his 11th-minute header came within inches of creeping inside the post.

McDonald also came close once more, but his stabbed effort rolled agonisingly wide.

With Birmingham's first real chance came the opener. David Cotterill was afforded time and space to pick out a good cross to Clayton Donaldson, who was left with the simple task of tapping the ball home from close range.

Cotterill then got his name on the scoresheet as he netted a free kick from 30 yards to give the visitors a stranglehold on the game.

The winger almost made it 3-0 shortly before the break, but David Forde palmed his close-range shot away.

Millwall introduced Aiden O'Brien and Richard Chaplow at the break as they looked for a way back into the game, and it took them less than 10 minutes of the second half to reduce the deficit.

O'Brien threaded a good pass through to Lee Gregory, who guided a composed finish beyond Darren Randolph to open his Millwall account and peg the visitors peg to 2-1.

Gregory and then Lee Beevers headed at Rudolph as a partisan home crowd roared their resurgent side on to find an equaliser, but it was Birmingham who had the last say, as substitute Wes Thomas sent a simple finish beyond Randoplh.

There was still time for Millwall to go close as Shaun Williams struck the foot of the post late on, but Lee Clarke's side held on to seal a first win since August.