Last updated on .From the section Championship

Sam Gallagher has scored five goals in his past seven games for Birmingham City

Championship strugglers Birmingham City came from behind to earn a valuable away point against Preston North End at Deepdale.

Preston broke the deadlock early on as Blues failed to clear a free-kick and Ben Davies was on hand to fire home.

Birmingham levelled as Jacques Maghoma rounded Preston keeper Chris Maxwell and set up Sam Gallagher to finish.

Cheikh N'Doye came close to giving Blues all three points, but his late header was cleared away.

The result left Birmingham City in 23rd place in the Championship table, but just a point away from safety.

Meanwhile, Alex Neil's Preston slipped a place to 11th in the table following the stalemate.

The result extended Preston's unbeaten run against Blues to nine league matches, while Steve Cotterill is yet to win a league game at Deepdale in eight visits with five clubs - Stoke City, Burnley, Portsmouth, Bristol City and Birmingham.

Preston manager Alex Neil:

"I thought individually and collectively that's the poorest we've been since I've been at the club. So that's really disappointing.

"We didn't deserve anything from the game so the only bonus we can take is that we've got a point.

"I thought we were flowery and soft, they did the fundamentals very well but we were lacking that today. Performance-wise was really poor."

Birmingham City boss Steve Cotterill told BBC WM:

"We'll be going home disappointed tonight because we think our performance merited the win today.

"We could have gone two goals up before they scored.

"We've been playing well for a little while now. This isn't a coincidence - this is starting to be a good, consistent team."