Yahoo News Tony Mowbray watches Birmingham City and has shared messages with Gary Rowett
Gary Rowett says that he has maintained correspondence with Birmingham City manager Tony Mowbray, who remains at home and in recovery mode following a health diagnosis which required him to undergo a period of treatment. Mowbray has had successful surgery since being forced to step away from his managerial responsibilities back in February.
That news came on the back of an excellent double win at St Andrew's over former clubs Sunderland and Blackburn Rovers and, at that stage, it looked as though Blues were set to pull away from relegation peril under Mowbray, who replaced Wayne Rooney as the club's third permanent manager of the season in January. Since, under unsuspecting caretaker Mark Venus who was thrust into the position, Blues have slipped back down the table.
Rowett arrived during the recent March international break and he has already been with the squad for almost a month; he guided Blues to a crucial win over Preston North End on Easter Monday, but that win has been sandwiched by dramatically late defeats at QPR and Leicester City. Now, they host Cardiff City and Coventry City at St Andrew's in the space of four days, desperate for a decent points haul.
Mowbray will be watching. Interim boss Rowett has revealed that, although as an experienced Championship boss in his own right, he has been left to take care of all aspects of preparation, coaching and team selection, he does still share communication with his colleague, who has kept an eye on Blues from afar and is believed to be desperate to return to work - all being well, Blues will expect to welcome him back in pre-season.
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"I've shared messages with him, not really around the team or anything like that, but I certainly would say that he has kept a close eye on the team," Rowett said. "He's watched the games, which I think is fabulous and it tells you all about Tony as a person - considering the situation he is in, where he needs to get healthy again, he still wants to see how the team does, and I think that's fantastic.
"I've said this originally, we've got to do it in our own way, but certainly there's always that thought in the back of your mind that Tony is somewhere watching and, hopefully, he can see a team fighting, scrapping but playing with the quality he'd want to see also. I think that's what we all want."
Rowett doesn't consider this a make or break week for Blues, but clearly this is a significant opportunity for the club to put some points on the board, make up points on their survival rivals and look to steer clear of the bottom three before any unwanted final day drama, permutations and requirements to earn a result.
Especially in front of their own fans, Blues have relatively delivered this season; if their away record this term is relegation form - only already relegated Rotherham's is worse - their points return from their 20 home games - 30, with eight wins - is comfortably mid-table. It is surely in B9, which won't be their home for more than the next few years after last night's announcement, where they must continue to take advantange of the partisan backing.
"It's a big week," Rowett added. "You take the positives out of Leicester, knowing that this week is going to have a bigger chance of defining your season than perhaps Leicester. It's about us doing what we need to at home, performing with the right intensity and quality, on and off the ball. If we do that, I'm sure we can have another really positive week, another opportunity to show what we can do as a team.
"Every game is different. Every game now is just about trying to do everything you can to win it. At this stage, you have to move on very quickly regardless. If you win the game...as Preston showed, you win the game and feel good, but it doesn't help in the next game unless you do the right things again.
"The feeling of winning is like no other. You'd certainly like to go into games with that feeling, than on the back of a disappointment. That's our aim. We have one game coming up. Of course we have another home game Saturday, but I don't think we can look past this first game, do our jobs as well as we can and we'll certainly set the team up to give them a good chance of performing."
