Brum line up O'Connor swoop

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The Scotland international is available at £2.5million and talks between the two clubs are already at an advanced stage.

City manager Steve Bruce is desperate for new firepower following the return of Nicklas Bendtner to Arsenal after his loan spell.

He was unsuccessful with a £3million bid for West Ham's Marlon Harewood earlier in the week but may be more fortunate in his attempts to sign 24-year-old O'Connor.

Fulham, Everton and Portsmouth have also been linked with the player who scored 58 goals in 164 appearances for Hibernian before moving to Moscow 15 months ago.

A Lokomotiv spokesman said: "Birmingham want a lot of clauses included. They want to arrange the payment to take into account whether or not they stay in the Premiership.

"We would prefer a deal with no clauses. The negotiation of the financial details will continue and everything will be concluded within 48 hours."

It was a lack of goals which proved to be Blues' Achilles heel when they were last in the top flight two years ago.

On the international front O'Connor has been in good form recently, scoring the only goal in Scotland's friendly victory over Austria and also being on target in the 2-0 win over the Faroe Islands.

Bruce currently has Cameron Jerome, DJ Campbell and Rowan Vine at his disposal but all lack Premiership experience while Mikael Forssell has been dogged by injury problems for the past three years and a doubt remains over his future.