Birmingham City, Gary Rowett decision still surprises to this day: View | OneFootball

Rowett was surprsingly sacked while Birmingham were moving well in Championship on the cusp off the playoffs until the club's form nosedived.

Birmingham City shocked many EFL fans in 2016 when they sacked Gary Rowett after a successful spell at St. Andrew's.

Rowett joined the Blues from Burton Albion after he impressed in his first managerial role, taking the Brewers on an upwards trajectory and reaching the League Two play-offs in 2013, which led them to the League Two title in the 2014/15 season.

The Blues ruthlessly dismissed Rowett and replaced him with Gianfranco Zola, whose spell at the club wasn't pretty, to say the least.

Birmingham were on the cusp of the play-off places in the Championship at the time and had just beaten Ipswich Town 2-1, so many thought the decision was mad by the West Midlands club's former owners.

The decision was indeed mad. Once Zola was appointed, everything seemed to go wrong, with the Chelsea legend only finding his first win in the Championship after nine games.

Results continued to crumble under Zola and the Blues nosedived down the table before Harry Redknapp was appointed and led a late surge to keep Birmingham in the second tier.

Rowett joined Derby County later that season and flourished at the Rams, propelling them to ninth, and the season after guiding them to the play-offs.

The only unsurprising thing about the Rowett sacking was that it proved to be the wrong decision.

Rowett decision still surprises to this day

Rowett returned to Birmingham in March last season to take charge with Tony Mowbray out on medical leave. He was tasked with a late attempt at keeping the club in the Championship, but it was too little, too late.

His brief second spell did at least allow him to shed some light on what had really gone down back in 2016.

Speaking to BirminghamLive following his reappointment, he explained that he had turned down a new contract ahead of his departure but wasn't looking to leave and even admitted that it wasn't a huge surprise to him.

Rowett said: "People in football are usually outraged by the decision but usually when you’re on the inside you know there’s little things going on. I had just been offered a new contract, but I had turned it down for different reasons. It wasn’t because I wanted to leave.

"There was this thing around at the time that I wanted to leave, and I was speaking to other clubs or whatever, but it’s really simple as a manager. I had a clause in my contract and if a club paid it and I wanted to go, I could go and nobody could stop me. If I wanted to go, I would have gone. And there was a lot of outside interest from other clubs because we had done a good job.

"I turned up at the meeting and there were two representatives from the club, not the new owners, and they gave me the news. I understand it because they want to do it in person.

"A club doesn’t want a manager to say they sacked me by text or over the phone. The only thing I asked at the time was to let me tell the players and staff myself. I drove over from the ground to Wast Hills to tell the lads and the staff. They were in a little bit of shock."

You could argue there was a bit of tension between Rowett and Birmingham at the time. His rejecting of the new contract may have given indications to the owners that he no longer wanted his part at St. Andrew's.

The decision has taken its effect to this day. Rowett had his Birmingham side playing well in his system.

He squeezed out combined efforts from individuals who were playing above and beyond themselves, such as Michael Morrison and Lukas Jutkiewicz.

Speaking to BirminghamLive in 2017 as Derby's manager, after his side’s 2-1 win over the Blues at St Andrew’s, he was adamant in his belief that Birmingham had every chance to achieve promotion in the 16/17 season and kick on from there.

Rowett said: "People will say there is no way we could have got promoted, but if you look at our points tally and average points combined with the first window where we could actually bring better players in - if you can tell me that honestly, then I would say people are lying."

During his time at St. Andrew's in this season, his Blues were averaging 1.6 points per game. If he had stayed, that could've amounted to a lot more than their final points tally of 53.

Momentum could've kicked on and, with a promising team, it could've cemented Birmingham as a side challenging for the play-offs in years to come.

Judging by his belief in the players and his own belief in himself, the only thing that would stand in his way would be the owners and, at that time, Trillion Trophy Asia, weren't exactly taking their role as owners by storm.

However, if Rowett had stayed, who knows, maybe we'd be seeing the Blues fighting it out in the top half of the Championship, rather than seeking their return to the Championship from League One.

A confusing decision to this day, and one they've lived to regret.