Birmingham 2-3 Newcastle

&c

Newcastle are into the hat for the 5th round draw of the FA Cup for only the fourth time in 19 years* after a blockbuster 3-2 win at St Andrews, making it six away wins on the bounce.

This was yet another Newcastle game with an early goal, sloppy marking allowing Birmingham to drill home from a corner within 50 seconds.

A Newcastle side with 9 changes (most notably including starts for Pope, Wilson, Miley, Targett and Osula) struggled to find their rhythm until Joe Willock had a shot saved before blasting the rebound over the bar.

As players retreated into their positions for a goal kick, the ref spotted the linesman flagging that the initial shot had been saved behind the line.

Replays proved inconclusive as to whether the whole ball had crossed the line, but Newcastle had momentum and the ball firmly in the back of the net five minutes later.

After great work from the lively Osula down the right, he somehow contrived to spoon the ball into the air with an open goal from two yards out, Callum Wilson following in to poke the ball home with his foot a good six feet in the air.

If I was slightly worried about it being pulled back for a high boot, I was far more concerned about Wilson's hamstrings.

As it was he looked lively and played for nearly an hour.

Newcastle couldn't make it to half time ahead as in the 40th minute Iwata scored what might honestly be one of the best goals I've ever seen - imagine if Tonali's shot off the bar against Fulham had gone in, with the power of *that* Obafemi Martins goal vs Spurs.

Without wanting to come across as a Premier League softy, the second half descended into a borderline disgraceful smashfest.

The catalyst seemed to be a Birmingham midfielder being stretchered off after sliding in on Miley, though Miley didn't seem to do much wrong other than not pulling out.

From there there were numerous infractions from the League One side ranging from two-footed slide tackles from behind (on Osula) to sly off the ball digs (on Krafth) to a literal rugby tackle into the advertising hoardings (on Willock, who was also the victim of a rake down the achilles and did well to carry on).

I'm sure it was great 'throwback football' for the neutral but it was nail-biting stuff as a Newcastle fan knowing how thin our squad is, especially given the tough run of fixtures coming up.

In the end though, we kept our heads, kept playing football and Willock popped up with a winner near the end.

He spoke eloquently about the support he's had from the club following deranged abuse on social media, and as a player I've always liked and rated it would be good to see him get back into his best form.

So into the hat for the next round, because winning in cups is something we do now.

*I think - pretty sure I read that somewhere.