Carsley: buying right players key to Brum’s survival
Birmingham clinched promotion with a tense 2-1 win over Reading on Sunday to secure an immediate return to the Premier League.
And Carsley feels having yo-yoed between the Premier League and Championship on an annual basis in recent seasons the time has come for the club to become an established top-flight outfit.
“I think it’s important now that the club show the fans that we can be stable in the Premier League,” said the 35-year-old former Republic of Ireland midfielder.
“It has been a yo-yo existence for the club. We have got to get the right kind of players in and that’s not always going to be the flair players.
“I’m sure the fans are looking forward to Man United, Liverpool, Chelsea and Arsenal coming to St Andrew’s and that’s how it should be for the next 10 years. Now that we’ve got out of the Championship we all have to look forward to next season and the club has to consolidate and then make progress.”
‘‘So we need to build the right kind of team and then every season add two or three quality players.”
Birmingham manager Alex McLeish has spelt out his desire to sign on-loan midfielder Lee Bowyer on a permanent basis – providing his wage demands are not too high.
Bowyer was signed from West Ham on a temporary basis in January.
Meanwhile, Shane Long believes Reading have the character to bounce back from the disappointment of missing out on automatic promotion by going up via the play-offs.
Having lost to Birmingham on the last day of the season, the Royals must now refocus on the play-offs and a clash with Burnley at Turf Moor on Saturday.
“I think we definitely have the character to do it,” declared the Tipperary man.
“We definitely need to lift ourselves. Burnley away will be a hard game. We have to go up there and do the business and come home with a lead to defend and go from there and hopefully do the business at Wembley.”
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