Will Birmingham City's team selection tonight be influenced by a trip to Wembley five days later?

It could be a momentous week for ‘The Blues’ who will clinch an immediate return to the Championship with a win against a Posh side reeling from a derby day capitulation at the Weston Homes Stadium on Saturday. Regardless of the League One result tonight Birmingham will start Sunday’s Vertu Trophy Final against Posh as hot favourites.

There is a school of thought suggesting the champions-elect would prioritise Wembley given their 11-point lead at the top of the League One table.

But manager Chris Davies hasn’t given a lot away. He told Birmingham Live: “It’s all there for us this week. You can see what it could be, but we’ve got to try and make into a reality with our performances. The focus now has to be seeing how we go down there away from home, try to get a result, and move on from there.

“I’ll see how everyone is and where they all are physically. We’ve played three games in a week after the international break and some have played a lot of minutes, and some are coming back from injury.

“I’ve got a lot to consider when I’m thinking about what’s needed. We obviously want to win the next game, that’s the most important thing, but we also obviously know that Wembley is there at the weekend as well.”

Fergie on embracing the challenge

Davies has such a big and talented squad to select from they will still expect to beat a Posh team crushed 4-0 at home by Northampton Town last time out if they made changes.

The match will now be televised live on Sky Sports Plus, a change of scheduling brought about by the prospect of Birmingham winning promotion with six games to spare. The big spending Blues have won 29 and lost just three of their 39 League One games so far. They are already on 92 points and can expect to beat the record tally for a League One season which is 103 by Wolves in the 2013-14 season.

Birmingham will be backed by almost 4,000 travelling fans at London Road tonight after Posh gave them an extra allocation of 1,600 tickets at the end of last week.

Posh are currently 15th in League One, but could drop two places tonight depending on the results of Exeter City v Wigan Athletic and Mansfield Town v Leyton Orient, as well as their own result. Only in the unlikely event of a Posh win could Darren Ferguson’s side move up the table, and they would need Rotherham United to lose at Bolton Wanderers.