Key players return from injury as Cobblers are edged out by Birmingham in pre-season friendly

Mitch Pinnock takes a shot at goal during Wednesday's friendly between Northampton Town and Birmingham City. Picture: Pete Norton / Getty

Jack Sowerby, Ali Koiki and Akin Odimayo all made welcome returns from injury as Cobblers continued their pre-season campaign with a 1-0 defeat to Birmingham City on Wednesday.

The bulk of Jon Brady’s squad got more valuable minutes in their legs as a fairly even contest at Sixfields swung the way of the Championship visitors thanks to an excellent first half finish from Jordan James.

Three trialists started with five more on the bench – including Josh Harrop – and Sowerby, Koiki and Odimayo were back involved again after missing several months with injury, but Shaun McWilliams, Harvey Lintott and Sam Hoskins all missed out for precautionary reasons.

A tepid first half took a while to warm up but Birmingham found their stride around 25 minutes in and they were close to an opener when neither Scott Hogan nor Tyler Roberts were able to get a clean strike away after the ball broke to them in the penalty box.

There were some bright moments for the Cobblers and one spell of pressure led to John Ruddy keeping out Louis Appéré’s 20-yard shot, but the hosts fell behind after 31 minutes when James collected Emmanuel Longelo’s lay-off on the right side of the box and clinically swept into the bottom corner.

Sam Sherring impressed at the back for Town and his superb through pass at the end of the first half released Kieron Bowie, who got into the penalty box before seeing a shot well blocked.

Hogan side-footed just wide at the start of the second half before Northampton created their best opening of the game when Mitch Pinnock found Bowie in the box, but he was denied by the legs of Neil Etheridge.

Whilst the rest of the game was hardly rich on entertainment, largely due to the usual raft of changes made by both sides, the greater thread did come from Birmingham with Max Dyche's terrific block thwarting Siriki Dembele and Lukas Jutkiewicz stinging James Dagde’s palms from long-range.

Jutkiewicz was denied by Dadge again late on as a very makeshift Cobblers team kept the deficit to one.

Cobblers: Dadge, Sherring ©, Dyche (Trialist F 72), Brough (Koiki 65), Trialist C (Odimayo 65), Hondermarck (Sowerby 65), Pinnock (Trialist D 72), Trialist E (Abimbola 75), Trialist B (Trialist H 72), Appéré (Trialist A 72), Bowie (Trialist G 65)

Subs not used: Burge

Birmingham: Ruddy © (Etheridge 45), Laird (Sanderson 62), M Roberts (Oakley 62), Chang (Bacuna 62), Sunjic, James (Khela 81), Longelo (Campbell 81), Long, Anderson, T Roberts (Jutkiewicz 62), Hogan (Dembele 62)

Subs not used: Jeacock

Referee: Josh Smith

Attendance: 2,540

Birmingham fans: 984