Wolves and Birmingham scrape through in Carling Cup
McCarthy's side were taken to penalties by League One Swindon Town
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By Will Haine. |  |
Tuesday, 25, Aug 2009 10:40
By Matt Hallam.
Wolves beat Swindon 6-5 on penalties after Danny Wilson's side held the Premier League club to a 0-0 draw in the second round of the Carling Cup.
Wolves fielded an entire new 11 with 17-year-old Nathaniel Mendez-Laing starting for first time.
McCarthy's team began confidently with new signing Kevin Doyle shooting wide early on.
Mendez-Laing made a number of promising runs on the right wing, causing problems for the Swindon defence and testing goalkeeper David Lucas.
However, League One Swindon appeared to have scored through Antony McNamee, but the striker was ruled offside.
Neither side offered much creativity as the game wore on and substitutions from both managers failed to impact on the game as it finished 0-0 after extra time.
Each team scored their first five penalties, taking the shoot out to sudden death, however Swindon captain Gordon Greer hit the post with the decisive spot kick, sending Wolves through to the next round.
Birmingham also struggled against lower league opposition, having to come from behind to beat Southampton.
Southampton beat Birmingham 2-0 at the same stage of the competition last year and looked as though they would do the same again until Birmingham's second-half comeback.
Two goals in three minutes from Lee Bowyer and Lee Carsley secured victory for their team after Southampton had taken the lead through Adam Lallana's curling shot just after half-time.
Lallana stole the ball from Sebastien Larsson and curled the ball past Birmingham goalkeeper Maik Taylor two minutes after half-time.
Southampton continued to dominate their Premier League opponents, and Stuart Parnaby prevented the South Coast side scoring a certain second with a superb block from Lallana's cross.
McCleish introduced Gary O'Connor with half an hour to play and his team began to dominate possession. They soon came up with the equaliser through Lee Bowyer who chipped the ball over Southampton keeper Kelvin Davies after a superb pass from Benitez.
The equaliser energised Birmingham and they stunned their League Two opponent's moments later when Lee Carsley drilled the ball into the net with ten minutes to go, sealing his side's place in the third round.
Struggling Portsmouth strolled past League Two Hereford at Fratton Park with a 4 - 1 win. Goals from Frederic Piquionne, John Utaka, Nico Kranjcar and Richard Hughes put Paul Hart's team 4 - 0 up before Tristan Plummer grabbed a late equaliser via the penalty spot.
Blackburn beat Gillingham 3-1 at Priestfield with goals from David Dunn, David Hoilet and Morten Gamst Pedersen. Dunn and Hoilet scored at the start of each half to put their side 2-0 up.
Simeon Jackson pulled one back for Gillingham with a penalty after being brought down by Zurab Khizanishvili. However Pedersen restored his side's lead with a goal directly from a corner to seal Sam Allardyce's first win of the season.