Garry Monk signals 'a new era' at Birmingham after securing Championship safety

A 3-1 victory over Fulham, who subsequently missed out on automatic promotion, ensured the Blues’ safety in dramatic fashion

Monk helped guide Blues to safety (Getty)

Garry Monk says a “new era” has begun at Birmingham City after the club avoided relegation on the final day of the Championship season.

A 3-1 victory over Fulham, who subsequently missed out on automatic promotion, ensured the Blues’ safety in dramatic fashion at St Andrew’s on Sunday afternoon.

Monk took over in March with 11 games to go, when the club were still two points adrift of safety. Speaking after the game, the 39-year-old was frank in setting out his plan ahead of next season, calling for significant changes.

“I said it before the game, that once this game is done, and we achieve what we want to achieve, it’s a new era,” Monk said. “There’s a lot of big clubs in this league and just because you’re a big club doesn’t give you the right to necessarily say you can avoid these situations – but it has to change. It has to change, the whole mentality. We have to change the standard of everything that’s doing, and be relentless with it. I can promise everyone that I’ll be relentless with it.”

Taking the reigns at Birmingham marked the Englishman’s fourth managerial role in less than three years, after stints at Swansea, Leeds and Middlesbrough. Though Blues have flirted with relegation for a couple of seasons in the Championship, Monk now believes he can put a strategy in place to take the club forward.

“I think you’ve seen the essence of it,” he said. “But I can promise from next season the work we’ve been trying to do is to make it even stronger, and even better than what we’ve done at the moment.”

“There’ll be people who can do it, and they’ll come with me with it, and there’ll be people that can’t, and they won’t be here,” he added. “It’s as simple as that. Because otherwise the club will keep making the same mistakes, we’ll keep being in the same position, so it has to change. The mentality of the whole club has to change.”

Jutkiewicz opened the scoring to set Blues on their way (Getty)

Had Fulham continued their unbeaten run of 23 games on Sunday, Birmingham might have had to rely on results at Preston and Derby, where Burton and Barnsley were respectively fighting to stay in the division. However, goals from Lukas Jutkiewicz, Harlee Dean and Che Adams were enough to keep City safe.

Describing the atmosphere in the dressing room after the game, Monk insisted that the smiles and sighs of relief will only be short-lived, as the threat of relegation is not something to be proud of.

Dean's goal gave Blues breathing room and they battled their way to safety (Getty)

“I think you saw from today we came out with the intention to finish it on our terms. We didn’t want to rely on anyone else,” he said, “The mission [has been] accomplished to stay in this league, and remain in this league.

“In terms of the standard setting, that’s not an achievement. That’s not what you come into football for, it’s not what I’m here for, it’s not what players should be here for, or anyone at the club should be here for.

“But we are in that situation, the club has been in that situation too often in the last five years, so of course there’s relief and happiness.”