WBA vs Man United shows why WBA face a pivotal pre-season

5-5, and a game which embodied a team readying for a pivotal pre-season. 

Steve Clarke’s West Bromwich Albion fought back from two three-goal deficits to haul back a point against the newly-crowned champions, Manchester United.

A sensational second-half hat-trick from on-loan striker, resident powerhouse and heir to Didier Drogba’s Chelsea throne Romelu Lukaku tied the game and shared the spoils on the final day of the 2012/13 season.

United accelerated to a 3-0 lead against a faltering Baggies side. Clarke’s men were being pulled around and the axis of Mulumbu, Yacob, McAuley and Olsson were straying from the usual dominant position in front of goal, in a Gandalf-esque ‘You shall not pass’ kind of defensive defiance. 

Outside of the protection afforded by bulk and sheer size inside and in front of the 18-yard box, Olsson and McAuley, the former especially, suffered greatly at the hands of United’s sublime movement.

Shipping five goals to Shinji Kagawa, Alexander Büttner, Robin van Persie and Javier Hernandez – and, in a microcosm of his post-Christmas season, an Olsson own goal, will be worrying for Clarke, despite the great comeback.

For, as great as the spectacle and, indeed, scoring five against the champions was, a team prided on defensive solidarity conceding five is worrying.

Even more worrying, however, is the superman heroics performed by Lukaku will more than likely be reserved for pastures greener, or certainly more internationally-based pastures. Whether with Chelsea or, as seems likely, Swansea City, it is doubtful that Lukaku will stay and ply his 17-goal haul – largely from substitute appearances – at The Hawthorns next season.

Adding to his departure, with the impending loss of stalwarts Zoltán Gera, Marc-Antoine Fortuné, Jerome Thomas and 15-goal-a-season man Peter Odemwingie, it could be a defining season for the Albion.

Jonas Olsson, too, is making admiring glances to London in an effort to push through a move. Why, other than landing at QPR, Charlton Atletic or the cavalcade of lower-league London clubs, Olsson thinks his performances over the last six months have been deserving of a lucrative move south, one can only wonder.

The outstretched leg, lashing a driven Antonio Valencia driven cross from the right past Ben Foster, summed up a dreadful latter half of the season for Olsson.

Slack defensive performances were not reserved for those seeking moves away from West Bromwich’s scenery, either. McAuley, two-year deal in the bag, was not much better and was nearly the hapless protagonist in a second own goal. Foster’s agility only saved Albion further embarrassment.

Having pulled a, what seemed, consolation goal as the first half was drawing to a close through Morrison’s flick after a vibrant move, Clarke gambled and replaced Ridgewell with Lukaku, pushing skipper Chris Brunt to left back.

And that was it, WBA’s trump card was played. It delivered, too. If, indeed, Lukaku was to be a card he would surely be the Jack. Just inside the realms of royalty, but potent against lesser lights and with scope to contest at the top, Lukaku, too, has scope to ascend Europe’s hights.

There lies the problem.

After yesterday, it is feared Clarke will not have a trump card left to play.

WBA made a barnstorming start to the season, sitting in fourth after 14 games with 26 points. By the turn of the year, Albion sat seventh: 20 played and 33 points attained.

Fast forward to the end of the campaign and Clarke’s men have only picked up another 16 points. 16 points in 18 games is, unfortunately, relegation form.

It must be said that eighth is a fantastic achievement, but if it were not for Swansea’s mirroring of WBA since their own League Cup triumph, we could have finished ninth.

At the end of it all, only 10 points clear of Sunderland Athletic in 17^th and eight points clear of Midlands rivals Aston Villa, who for the most part would have been deemed as enduring a terrible season.

Next season WBA are set to have a squad of:

GKs: Ben Foster, Boaz Myhill, Luke Daniels;

Defenders: Jonas Olsson, Gareth McAuley, Craig Dawson, Gabriel Tamas, Liam Ridgewell, Billy Jones, Gonzalo Jara;

Midfielders: Claudio Yacob, Youssuf Mulumbu, George Thorne, Graham Dorrans, Chris Brunt, Scott Allan, James Morrison;        

And strikers: Markus Rosenberg, Shane Long;

- if current speculation and lack of news on new deals be taken as truth.

And that’s without anyone currently unexpected transfers.

Like it seemed last season, the summer before the 2013/14 campaign could be pivotal for WBA. Steve Clarke has used his Chelsea connections to bring in a gem this season, albeit on loan. Let’s see if the same transfer ingenuity can stem a bad end to, otherwise, a great campaign.

Clarke is eyeing a selection of relegatees, if reports are to be believed…

Adrian Chiles calling Odemwingie a tw*t

West Bromwich Albion held its 2012/13 supporters night and there weren’t a lot of surprises in the awards: Gareth ‘G Mac’ McAuley cleaned up, Romelu Lukaku walked away with the top scorer award and James Morrison took the top assists award, fittingly for his contribution in Albion’s triumvirate attacking midfield.

What is a surprise, however, is famous Albion fan and ITV football powerhouse Adrian Chiles jokingly saying Albion’s want away striker Peter Odemwingie should receive the ‘Tw*t of the Year’ award for his Loftus Road deadline day escapades.

Odemwingie further endearing himself to WBA fans

Chiles wasn’t comparing Twitter fanatic Odemwingie to Roald Dahl’s children’s book The Twits either, if you’re with me here. 

No, he was comparing him to a female’s genitalia in a derogatory term sense. In a week where Reginald D Hunter’s brand of ethnicity-enthused comedy shocked professional footballers in its brazenness, Chiles and regularly under-reported Albion’s awards night failed to make much copy.

With SEO increasingly gripping online newspapers, I’d have thought it would have got more coverage.

It did make the Daily Post, Nigeria’s online newspaper, which commented the audience was “split between laughter and embarrassment as the reality of what Chiles had said sunk home”; probably in quiet agreement as much as anything else.

Whether he should have said it or not, he’s right. Chiles gets a lot of unfair criticism because he doesn’t fit the Sky Sports mould of distinguished gent who allows rambling ex-footballers to expunge a few clichés. He has a character and whether you like that or not ITV seem to.

Odemwingie was deserving of such derision. As a club who instilled faith into a man desperate to escape the racist, antiquated views of Russian football, and paying him a hefty sum for that liberation, I expect at the very least, like Harry Redknapp has said, for him to at least wait around the corner from the ground and not flaunt his back-stabbing.

Odemwingie was not present at the awards night, and that is probably enough of a vindication of his detrimental effect on Albion’s second-half season.

Fair play, Adrian. I’m sure if it were an award, no one else’s name would be more fitting than Odemwingie’s on that brass plate.

Billy Jones first WBA English scorer and takes bias stat with record

So the “only team to not have an English scorer this season” hoodoo is over and how very welcome it is.

Tad misleading though it is, it’s nice to be over.

When you hear of that stat – you can imagine enraged Sunderland, Norwich, Southampton and a cavalcade of mid-table teams up-in-arms, degrading The Baggies for not having enough English talent.

Well, we do. We have a back five that consists of three Englishmen, to be precise. There is a dearth of English goalscorers, as the national team can attest to, and we’ve stocked up on our home-grown boys in what we tend to do best on these isles: kick and head the ball away.

In Billy Jones’ case, we could add direct, jinking runs to that list and a composed finish – on his weak foot no less.

The stat is even more misleading, however, because at The Hawthorns there is a wealth of British players, all playing a prominent part in the mechanics of the squad.

Playing against Newcastle when the stat-men took a hit was Britons Foster, Jones, McCauley, Brunt, Morrison, and Long, who came on as a second half sub.

Adding to those stalwarts is Liam Ridgewell, representing our first choice left back and I for one will welcome him back after witnessing another hit and miss, mainly miss, performance from spitter Goran Popov. Ridgewell might not be fancy but at least he doesn’t get brushed over by Debuchy and he played a big part in Olsson’s dire back-pass with a hospital ball to the Swede. Popov did drive a beautifully accurate cross to Long for a headed chance so credit where it’s due.

I, for one, have been sceptical of the former Preston North End right back this season and have often pined for the solidity of Steven Reid at full back - but Jones’ performances have slowly ebbed away those doubts.

He now represents an agile, diligent full back who can add goalscoring to his repertoire.

Reliably informed by Twitter stat-men @BaggiesFacts, “Billy Jones won all 4 of his attempted tackles today [against Newcastle], as well as completing 3/4 successful take-ons. Oh and he scored!”

That’s a good return against a decent Newcastle United outfit, despite their perilous league position.

Jones, no longer a youngster at 25, is proving to have the capability to take over from Reid at right back on a permanent basis. Coupling together endeavour in attack and defence and an astute ability to pass the ball, the hair-banded right back has started every match for The Baggies since March 2.

Summer search for a right back should be off and a Lukaku-like forward put top of the list.

Let’s see what du-du-du Romelu Lukaku is up to for 2014, yeah?

David Luiz more like Sideshow Bob than Brazilian centre back

Image from Luzbel Andrea

David Luiz is one of those defenders who escapes criticism because he can pass a ball more than 20 yards.

Against England at Wembley, the Chelsea defender had two instances where he resorted to manhandling Chelsea team-mate Gary Cahill when he rose for a corner and, when Walcott danced inside him, forearm smashed him, leaving him holding his ribs and winded.

Chelsea have some real troubles in defence, in my opinion. They have a collection of players who aren’t top class defenders and are lauded for their exploits in other areas of the pitch.

Case in point is Branislav Ivanovic. Just because he can power-header a corner in every now and again, everyone is willing to overlook his frequent lapses in defence.

Fans and critics need not look too far to see him giving away two, not one but two goals against Swansea, which ended up eliminating them from the semi finals of the Carling Cup.

The Sideshow Bob’s performance(s) have been all too, well, similar to the actual Bob wearing a football shirt. Frequently switching off and living off the reputation of ‘being able to bring the ball out of defence’.

I’d take my defenders being able to defend first and foremost, thanks.

Hazard sent off for wrestling ball off a ball-boy. Ridiculous but why put yourself in that situation?

It’s not Eden Hazard’s job to be judge, jury and executioner.

The ball boy was obviously taking the mick and being laboriously slow about giving the ball back to Petr Cech. But it’s the referees job to adjudicate what action should be taken, not a Chelsea player.

The FA states in its rulebook:

“Any subsequent injuries, or additional delays, including time wasting, will result in further time being added on.  No further communication will be necessary.

"Referees are to ensure that the full allowance is made for time lost and subsequently played.”

It says nothing about players taking vigilante action. If the ball boy is taking the piss throwing balls back then alert the referee and it’s his job to sort it out.

In a world where teams move their advertising hoardings in to hinder Stoke City’s throws, any little advantage is sought. It’s blindingly obvious that the ball boy has been told to be painstakingly slow but that’s expected, surely?

It’s the same dynamic as when a Sunday league goalkeeper trudges to fetch the ball to waste time. It’s called destruction tactics, not pretty but part of the game.

It happens, it’s obvious. But, because Chelsea aren’t good enough to pull a 2-0 defecit back against Swansea City Eden Hazard is allowed to take his own vigilante retribution against anyone he deems as impeding the game?

Sounds like the role of a match official to me.

Hazard has confronted him, touched him and he’s fell down in a heap on the ball. It’s theatrical and nonsensical. 

Even more nonsensical is Hazard kicking the ball from under him and, as it seems, kicking the ball boy, albeit minimally, in doing so.

This is a ball boy. Is the name not enough? Eden Hazard has confronted and kicked him, even if it's inadvertent.

How can the ref not send him off? Of course he’s tried to kick the ball and I’m not in anyway saying he’s gone out to hurt a ball boy but in what world can that be acceptable conduct from a professional footballer.

Eden Hazard cost £30m and should act more like a player befitting that price tag. 

West Brom's 'bogie team' run nothing to do with curses

A hoodoo, bogie team – or whatever other fantasy name they can be called – is essentially that. I don’t buy into them one bit.

If a team is regularly losing to ANother team it’s because one of two things: they’re a better team; or their playing style is hard for the other team to compete with – thus getting the better of said team.

That’s it.

There is no mythical curse that falls over The Hawthorns or The Britannia every time the two teams clash. It’s the fact that Ryan Shawcross and Robert Huth et al systematically fouled the game into submission.

There is no mystical veil that encompasses the Liberty Stadium every time the Albion clash with Swansea. That one’s down to them passing WBA off the park.

And there’s certainly no malevolent charm that permeates West Brom’s players when they visit Craven Cottage. WBA get pasted there through fielding an abundance of ineptitude or vertically challenged back-lines.

The furore that follows these ‘bogie teams’ around – where pundits, having conducted their mandatory six minutes of research before punditry, dig out Wikipedia stats about a team’s fortunes – are a load of rubbish, too.

Just because WBA lost a game to Oxford United in 1967, and then lost the next time they played in 1998 (imaginatively) doesn't mean that there’s a curse halting the team’s progress. In 2012 the squad is completely different to the one whom played the previous encounters and therefore the previous match has no bearing on this one.

What there is, however, is a mental block which pervades through from the fans and media to the team whom are lead to believe that they cannot win – and that isn't their fault. They expect to lose because they’re told the fates won’t let them.

It’s a simple fact (now starting to sound like Rafa Benitez’s infamous rant) that tactics and performances - of Billy Jones and Peter Odemwingie particularly - conspired to gift Swansea and unassailable lead. And Stoke’s tactical fouling strangled any life that the Albion line-up picked to combat Stoke City’s size could muster.

No hoodoo, no bogie team – just players not playing well.

The quicker people realise this, the better it can be for all of us to just get on with our team’s ineptitudes. Barcelona must have a curse hanging over everybody else and Queen’s Park Rangers have everyone else’s curse, if we buy into hoodoo hysteria.

“I’m talking about facts…”