- Birmingham have won eight of their last ten matches in all competitions (D2, L0).
- Brentford have won two of their last five matches in all competitions (D2, L1).
Blues are buzzing
Birmingham City enter this EFL Cup 2026-2027 second-round encounter with Brentford in great form after winning eight of their last ten in all competitions (D2, L0). Chris Davies has them playing a compact, narrow 4-4-2 shape, pressing hard and transitioning quickly - so they should bring some energy to St Andrew's Knighthead Park on Tuesday.
Birmingham drew 0-0 with Sheffield United in the Championship last weekend, and a 1-0 win at Swansea City in the previous round of this competition preceded a 2-2 draw with Barcelona in a friendly before Birmingham won on penalties. Thus the Blues are in good shape at the moment.
Bees are a balanced team
The Bees enter this cup clash on a two-game winning streak, having dispatched Rennes 4-2 away in their most recent fixture and thrashed Eintracht Frankfurt 7-0 in a home friendly a week prior. However, their form has been a little more consistent than spectacular across all competitions - W3, D5, L2 from their last ten.
Keith Andrews' men are a flexible team, capable of playing back-three or back-four systems and transitioning from one to the other at pace. They're a threat from set plays and can get into a lot of different areas, so I think they'll be able to change the shape of this game at any point and catch Birmingham out in transition if the Blues try to drag them into a high-tempo battle.
Brentford are the favourites, but this looks like a cup scrap
Brentford are a clear 89/100 favourites here, but Birmingham are a solid 11/4 and the draw is 13/5, suggesting the bookmakers aren't taking the home record of the hosts into account enough. Birmingham have won four, drawn zero and lost zero home games across all competitions, and are controlling games at St Andrew's.
As such, I'm going to take the Bees on the Draw No Bet market, but both teams to score at 3/5 and over 2.5 match goals at 67/100 also look solid to me. Birmingham are scoring an average of 3.00 goals per match at home in all competitions, conceding an average of 1.75, and Brentford are averaging 1.20 away, so we're unlikely to see a shootout between the teams.
