Dean Smith: Aston Villa didn't play well in victory over Blues

Alan Hutton scored a superb individual goal to cap a six-goal thriller and earn Smith’s men a third straight Championship win.

Lukas Jutkiewicz had earlier put the visitors in front, while Che Adams also hit the post as Blues started the stronger.

Jonathan Kodjia, Jack Grealish and Tammy Abraham, from the penalty spot, all scored in the space of 14 minutes either side of half-time to put Villa in command.

And though Kristian Pedersen pulled one back to give Blues hope, Hutton sealed the three points when he raced from 10 yards inside his own half before finishing past visiting keeper Lee Camp.

The win moved Smith’s men up to eighth in the table, though the head coach admitted his team had perhaps been below their best.

He said: “The fact that we’ve won is great but I went through the rollercoaster emotionally because I don’t think we played very well.

“There is a lot more to our team than we’ve shown today but we have to give credit to Birmingham City because they’re very effective at what they do and awkward to play against.

“When Adams hit the post it turned our players and they moved the ball a lot quicker.

“They were too slow on the ball today, they moved the ball too slowly defensively.”

The victory was a special one for Smith, who grew up a Villa supporter.

His team have now won four of the six games since he replaced Steve Bruce in the hotseat.

And he said: “We’ve just got to keep the belief going.

“Emotionally I was OK. I took a couple of seconds when Lukas Jutkiewicz was brought off and savoured the atmosphere.

“There was a fantastic crowd who were very supportive and we sent a lot of people home happy.

“I’ve got a lot of family and friends here who are Villa fans and it was nice to celebrate it by beating our arch-rivals.”