They entered the League Cup at the second round and reached the final, in which they defeated local rivals Aston Villa 3–1 on aggregate score to win the first (and, until 2011, only) major trophy in their history.

Because of the severe winter weather – the so-called "Big Freeze of 1963" – Birmingham played no matches for ten weeks, between 22 December and 2 March.

Their opening third-round FA Cup-tie against Bury was postponed 14 times and abandoned once before finally being played two months after the originally scheduled date.

Birmingham took the lead when Jimmy Harris fed Bertie Auld who crossed for Ken Leek's powerful shot, but Aston Villa equalised via Bobby Thomson.

Former England centre half Trevor Smith marked Thomson out of the game,[5] Birmingham's defensive tactics included repeatedly kicking the ball out for throw-ins,[6] and Aston Villa were unable to break their opponents down.