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Birmingham City recovered from the first-half sending off of captain Lee Carsley to beat Championship leaders Wolverhampton Wanderers 2-0 at St. Andrew's.

Goals from Cameron Jerome and his replacement Garry O'Connor were enough to move the Blues to within two points of Mick McCarthy's men and Alex McLeish's side were full value for the three points.

Carsely was rightly sent-off for a shocking tackle that ended the evening of Wolves' striker Chris Iwelumo in the 37th minute, but the extra man actually proved detrimental to the visitors who never recovered from the loss of their target man.

Instead it was Birmingham who took the lead on the stroke of half-time as Jerome took advantage of hesitancy on the part of Wolves' keeper Wayne Hennessey; the Blues striker just sandwiching himself between Hennessey and Matt Hill as Liam Ridgewell's initially harmless looking flick-on dropped down, before bundling the ball into the net from barely a yard out.

Another defensive horror show led to the second in the 69th minute as O'Connor nicked in to nudge the ball past the on-rushing Hennessey after a short header back from Christophe Berra hung the keeper out to dry. The Scottish striker did well to keep his balance before firing into the empty net.

Wolves barely threatened as they looked for a way back into the game and while they still have an eight-point lead over promotion-chasing Reading and Sheffield United, those two sides have a game in hand on the two Midlands pacesetters.

McCarthy was forced to give Marlon Harewood his first start since joining on loan from Aston Villa after top scorer and Championship player of the year Sylvain Ebanks-Blake was ruled out with a hamstring injury.

However, Wolves still had plenty of presence up front while Iwelumo was on the field, with the Scottish international looking particularly effective from Stephen Ward's long throws.

Both sides were living off scraps in the first-half, with the quality of passing - not helped by the woefully bumpy pitch - letting both sides down.

It was no surprise that the best chance before the sending-off came from an error, with Ward's errant back pass almost letting in Jerome, only for Hennessey to storm out well to get to the ball first.

However, the entire game changed after the red card, but not in the way one might have expected.

Carsley flashed his studs high into the leg of Iwelumo and both players headed for the dressing room: Carsley with his head hung low, Iwelumo on a stretcher.

McCarthy was forced to bring on the less physical Andy Keogh up front and from there on the ball was not sticking with the Wolves forwards anymore.

Jerome's gift of goal in first-half stoppage time gave the Blues something to hang on to in the second half, but they did more than just that with Lee Bowyer and Sebastian Larsson both going close before O'Connor doubled their advantage.

At the other end, Wolves had plenty of possession but did not seem to know what to do with it.

Their delivery into the box was poor and the best effort they could muster all night was a stinging shot from outside the box from Matthew Jarvis that Maik Taylor did well to push over the bar.

There was only eight minutes to go at that stage, and by then the Birmingham fans were already doing the conga in the stands.

The Blues comfortably held to claim the three points that gives a significant boost to their promotion push and puts them back in the hunt for the Championship title.

Wolves looked hot favourites for that crown before this derby but will struggle to hang on to top spot with performances like this.

Seán Fay / Eurosport