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Rhoys at the ready

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Rhoys Wiggins is set to be the man to replace Grounds…

Five yellow cards this season has meant that Jonathan Grounds is out of this Sunday’s Second City derby against Aston Villa.

The left back picked up his fifth booking of the season against Burton for arguing with the linesman over whether or not their second goal was offside.

Gary Rowett now has to decide between Rhoys Wiggins and Paul Robinson as the man to replace Grounds.

It will most likely be Wiggins filling the void and, with him not playing too much football recently, it does worry me a bit.

For a lot of people, Grounds is someone to jump on as soon as he makes the slightest mistake or doesn’t perform as well as others. A bit of a scapegoat, if you like.

For me, I feel like a lot of the good work he does goes unnoticed and he is very much one of our most consistent players.

Since his arrival at Blues in 2014, Grounds has played in 104 of the 106 league games available which just shows how much of a part he has had to play in Rowett’s side.

Sunday’s derby will be the third league game he has missed in his time at Blues and I really do feel for him that it’s the Villa game he’s missing.

We will now see a bit of a different look to our back four with Wiggins coming in. He will most likely be a target for the Villa wingers due to his lack of match action and possible rustiness.

He really is going to be thrown into the deep end. His main focus must be to stay solid and hold his position.

It’s crucial that he doesn’t leave himself to be exposed and, although he will need to support the attack, I am sure that Rowett will drum into him how keeping solid is the first port of call.

The back four has only been changed once all season and that was due to Jonathan Spector`s injury which left him out of the Nottingham Forest defeat.

The shift in that game saw Ryan Shotton revert to right back with Robinson filling in at centre half.

With Wiggins being a left back, it should be straightforward enough for him to slot in and he will be working with the rest of the back four over the course of the week.

It’s not an ideal situation having to change a back four that has gained such an understanding with each other in these opening weeks of the season but Grounds` suspension has left us with no choice.

Hopefully Wiggins can come in, work his socks off, stay solid and, you never know, he could even turn out to be the hero. Stranger things have happened.

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