Nathan Redmond enhanced his burgeoning reputation with a superbly-taken late volley as Birmingham beat Portsmouth 1-0 to move up to third in the npower Championship.
The highly-rated 17-year-old substitute was brought on to bring much-needed life to City's attacking play and he did just that, with his 86th-minute swivelled volley seeing off a Portsmouth side who had appeared set for a battling point.
Jordon Mutch had gone close for City with a 25-yard strike which hit the outside of a post, but Blues, who have now found the net 20 times in the final nine minutes of games, produced yet another late show to move within two points of the automatic promotion places.
Portsmouth manager Michael Appleton admitted after the match that the longer the club's financial turmoil continues the harder it will become to maintain high spirits within his dressing room.
"I'm hoping for news over the next couple of days because the longer it goes on, obviously, the more difficult it's going to be to keep morale up and keep the players in a positive frame of mind.
"They're a decent bunch of lads, who've had to take a lot of hits over the last couple of months or so with everything that's going on, especially in the last week not being paid.
"I can't really any ask for any more effort."
Birmingham boss Chris Hughton says he is under no illusions about how good Redmond can become although while also keeping his feet on the floor.
"He's a wonderful player," said the Blues boss.
"He's a real talent, we genuinely don't like to get too carried away about players because we've seen it before when you get a player who doesn't get to the levels you think he is going to.
"At the moment I think we've managed him quite well."
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