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This article is part of Football FanCast’s The Chalkboard series, which provides a tactical insight into teams, players, managers, potential signings and more…

The Championship season is just three games old and Birmingham have experienced every result possible – a win, a draw and a loss in that very order, which sees them sit 15^th in the table.

Their latest result, a 3-0 defeat at the hands of Nottingham Forest suggests that four points from their opening two matches was somewhat a false front as they were exposed against an impressive Nottingham Forest side.

Birmingham were caught napping when Joe Lolley slotted home a low drive from a quickly-taken free-kick before headers from Lewis Grabban and Michael Dawson secured a 3-0 victory.

Scoring goals seems to be the problem for Pep Clotet’s men having lost two key men in the summer.

Che Adams joined Southampton in a £15m deal after netting 22 goals at St Andrew's whilst Jota joined arch-rivals Aston Villa having laid on 11 assists.

The Blues have scored just two solitary goals in their three Championship matches.

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On the Chalkboard

The problem may lie in how they set up with just one striker in attack.

As Lukas Jutkiewicz showed in the 3-0 drubbing by Forest, he’s given far too much to do without any real support.

His heatmap and touchmap, courtesy of WhoScored, show the areas of the pitch he occupied during spells of the game.

You don’t really want your striker coming deep or drifting out wide to try and get the ball – and even at 39 touches, it was the lowest of any other Birmingham player who started the game which suggests no one was able to sufficiently provide or support him.

The 30-year-old also recorded a poor passing success rate of just 38.1% whilst only two of his four shots hit the target. He meanwhile lost possession four times too.

Had another player been in the vicinity of him then maybe the striker would have had a much better game.

If Clotet is going to have any success with the West Midlands club going forward, he may need to find a system which would allow Jutkiewicz some sort of support up top.

Whether that be throwing attacking midfielder Dan Crowley further forward or playing their only other senior striker option Alvaro Gimenez alongside him.

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