Delighted Davies hails best display of his reign

CHRIS Davies hailed Birmingham City's best performance since he came to club - and his set-piece experts.

- By BRIAN DICK

Blues battered Portsmouth 4-0, three of their goals coming from restarts, with Alex Cochrane providing assists for Paik Seung-ho and Christoph Klarer and Tommy Doyle's corner being flicked home by Tomoki Iwata.

The Japanese right-back also laid on the pass for Keshi Anderson to score a fourth in open play.

That all but ends criticism of Blues' set-piece return this season and lifts the pressure which had been building on Davies as Blues won for the third time in eight games and moved back into the top half of the Championship.

"I think it was really complete from our point of view, I was really pleased with a lot of it," said Davies. "We started really well, really bright, really aggressive, a lot of quality, the best we played obviously this season, I don't think they had a shot on goal and we had probably five, six, seven big chances. There was a lot in there and a lot I'm happy about because I think it's been coming. We've been close in games, we've been tight and fine margins. I'm pleased that we managed to bring it all together today."

Asked whether it was the best display during his tenure, given the fact it came at Championship rather than League One level, he said: "I think it's up there.

"I thought we had some good bits and people say, 'How?' But against Hull, I thought we had some really good bits with the ball, just sloppy defensively on a few occasions.

"I think the Swansea game I liked us. I thought we were pretty fluid and moments in other games But as a complete performance to bring everything together it was by far our best of the season.

"Set-pieces we have been working on, we obviously won a game up at Preston off a set-piece with a real good ball and timing.