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

Let’s not write this guy’s obituary just yet.

Having started the first eight league games of the season, David Davis has since been reduced to a substitute. With the emergence of Ivan Sunjic into the fray as a defensive midfielder and other options further up the field, that spell could be about to get longer.

That doesn’t mean that his time at St Andrew’s should come to a grinding halt though, he still has a role to play.

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On the chalkboard

Pep Clotet has stressed the importance of defensive football, and playing defensively has been Davis’ forte.

With an average of 2.6 tackles and 0.8 interceptions per game, he’ll come in use when they need to ‘park the bus’ as it were.

There will be games this season where Birmingham City will need to be very much on the defensive and that is where Davis comes into play.

Even if he doesn’t start the game, there will be occasions where the Blues will need to see out a game, although ideally, they won’t leave it as late as they did against Middlesbrough before the international break.

Much like in baseball where they have a ‘closing pitcher’, someone to bring in when the game is safe and to simply see out the game, Davis can act in that role but in a footballing sense.

He can be someone to sit in front of the backline and snuff out attacks before they have a chance to get started.

With a passing accuracy of 79.7%, he’d also be able to help start a counter-attack if the opportunity presented itself.

So even though he might not be a regular right now, he can still find himself with a vital role to play, even if it isn’t one that you see every week.