£3m Bruce break-up costs Blues a fortune

No such luxury for Birmingham, the club he left behind. Bruce's season isn't finished.

Scroll down to read more:

His Wigan team stand between his old boss Sir Alex Ferguson and the title next weekend, but life is a lot more comfortable than for the boys in Blue.

While Wigan have surged into 13th place with their win in Birmingham against Aston Villa on Saturday, Birmingham are running out of steam.

They lost 2-0 to Fulham on Saturday and didn't have a shot on target, leaving them in 19th position and staring at an immediate return to the Championship.

The power-brokers at St Andrew's who continue to impugn their former manager's reputation are, right about now, looking for the knives to cut open a humble pie that should be cooked to perfection by about 5pm this Sunday.

They took £3million from Wigan chairman David Whelan in return for Bruce.

They were apparently glad to see the back of the manager who orchestrated Birmingham's return to the top flight.

The gamble looks to have back-fired.

For all the mud-slinging that has subsequently taken place between the two warring parties, the undeniable fact is that Bruce and his No 2 Eric Black took over a team in a worse position than the one he left behind.

Alex McLeish's points total is 0.03 per game healthier than his predecessor's, but Bruce had a track record of making big decisions when it mattered to lead the club to safety. And he has managed, with only minor tweaks to the personnel, to do exactly that at Wigan.

The desire to repay Whelan's faith — the kind of faith Birmingham's owners perhaps did not show — has driven him to succeed.

'The chairman paid out an unbelievable amount of money to turn his club around,' said Bruce. 'I'm delighted to have paid him back.

'I had nine points with 16 games gone. We have picked up 31 since then, which is remarkable.

'I might be proud of what I did with Birmingham but this is as big an achievement as I've had.'

Bruce's secret lies in the common touch. He has never forgotten his roots but also has an ability to adapt to any situation. With more experience, he has become a better manager.

Bruce's greatest quality is his ability to motivate players.

Christophe Dugarry once threw down a challenge to Bruce after a disagreement over the relative merits of French and English boxers, squaring up to his manager.

The former Manchester United double winner left his lunch plate and adopted his own fighting stance before saying: 'No, I can't do it. Christophe, I'm standing by what I've said. There are no really good French boxers. And you aren't one of them.'

Bouncing around, Dugarry threw some name at him. 'No, Christophe,' corrected Bruce,'no good French fighters. The French are good at cooking, martial arts, football, not boxing.'

The trap was set.

Then came the challenge from the striker to name one Gallic exponent of any martial art. And a twinkle came into Bruce's eye.

'Eric Cantona,' he said. And Dugarry laughed. As did the assembled audience. Classic Bruce.

One wise-cracking anecdote does not, however, convey the true nature of a man who is far more complex than he appears on the surface.

Those who would pigeonhole Bruce as a bloke's bloke are not wrong. Those who see him as a football man, though uneducated on paper, who likes a laugh and a drink would not be wrong, either.

But to suggest the affable Geordie survives in the helter-skelter world of Premier League football through wise-cracks and a few sharp one-liners would do him a massive disservice.

Maybe Birmingham didn't know the value of what they had until it was gone.

After twice securing promotion to the top table of English football, keeping the club there on a net spend of £4m-a-year and now doing the same with Wigan, Bruce is answering all the questions about his ability.

'I'll be sorry for the Birmingham players, staff and the fans,' he said last Saturday. 'I really will. You can't spend eight years of your life at a football club as a player and manager and not have a tremendous amount of affection for the place. Anyone else?

'The players, staff and the supporters. Yes, I think that's everyone.'

For once, Steve Bruce was not smiling.