Middlesbrough 1-0 Birmingham City: Morgan Rogers hits late winner as Wayne Rooney suffers defeat
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Former West Brom youth player Morgan Rogers arrived at Boro in the summer from Manchester City
Wayne Rooney suffered defeat in his first game in charge of Birmingham City as his Blues side were beaten by Michael Carrick's Middlesbrough.
Young Midlander Morgan Rogers scrambled in an 89th-minute winner, just 13 minutes after coming off the bench, for his first goal for the club.
It was no more than the hosts deserved as they racked up a fifth straight win to climb to 13th in the Championship table, just a point behind Blues, who slip out of the play-off places to seventh.
It could hardly have been a much tougher start for Rooney to have his first game as Blues boss up against an in-form Boro side led by his old Manchester United and England team-mate Carrick.
But it ended up as a fourth successive away defeat for ambitious American-owned Blues.
Wayne Rooney and his assistant Ashley Cole could not find a way to reverse Birmingham City's poor away record
On an afternoon which began with 10 places between the two sides - 16th v sixth - Rooney made two changes for his first game at the helm.
Scott Hogan was restored up front in place of Juninho Bacuna, who was late back from international duty with Curacao, and there was a first start since February in the centre of midfield for Gary Gardner, who came off the bench to score the match-sealing third goal in John Eustace's last game, the 3-1 derby win over West Bromwich Albion 15 days earlier.
But, although Boro keeper Seny Dieng did keep out an early effort from Krystian Bielik, the hosts repeatedly got in behind the Blues back line.
Isaiah Jones was flagged for offside after having the ball in the net, while young striker Josh Coburn dragged his shot wide.
And Blues keeper John Ruddy had to make two key second-half saves from Hayden Hackney and Matt Crooks.
But Crooks was then involved in the move that led to Boro making their late breakthrough.
After Rogers set Crooks free out wide, when the low return pass came back in, the Halesowen-born former West Bromwich Albion youth team product arrived to prod the ball inside Ruddy's near post for his first goal since his summer arrival from Manchester City.
Who's next?
Rooney is now set for his first home game as Blues boss - against Hull City this Wednesday, followed by a televised lunchtime trip to Southampton next Saturday.
Carrick's improving Boro now go to Norwich City on Tuesday before hosting Stoke City next Saturday.
Middlesbrough boss Michael Carrick told BBC Radio Tees:
"It's a great feeling winning football matches. And the clean sheet is important to us too. That's three in a row now.
"I know Wayne Rooney and his staff really well and I knew they'd be tough opposition and be well organised.
"But it was another massive contribution from the bench. Huge goal for us and Morgan Rogers. That will help him enormously. You need moments like that to feed off and I'm sure he'll have an even bigger impact moving forward."
Birmingham City manager Wayne Rooney told BBC Radio WM:
"We knew we'd have a lot of defending to do here, but we have to be better with the ball. There was a lack of care in the final third.
"We have done things differently to how they've been used to working and we need to build on fitness levels but it's not going to happen overnight.
"There are some positives but there's still an awful lot for us to work on and it's important we don't panic. Middlesbrough are a good team but we have to move on and look forward to Wednesday night."