1

Last Match Forum - 11/01 AFC Bournemouth (FA Cup 3 - A) / Re: After Match Debate

« on: Today at 12:40:46 AM »

I have been out of phone reception most of the day so can I ask why Brunt is getting things pinned on him? At the last few games it seemed like Abella was the more active/in charge coach, with Brunt doing the press duties. Not that he isn't responsible but I'm seeing a lot of "What was Brunt doing?!" and I just don't know why it's getting pinned on him.

Let's face it, while there are various routes into coaching, Brunt being loans manager suggests him being less fussed by on-the-pitch stuff, and Abella was a statistical analyst in the last setup. The Bournemouth coach is renowned for being an excellent tactician and their keeper probably costs more than are starting XI so no surprise really

2

General Football & Sports / Re: Ex Players Thread

« on: Yesterday at 11:45:58 PM »

The Premier League star who became a golf pro - https://www.bbc.com/sport/golf/articles/c786yvpjxwzo

Peter Odemwingie is having a crack at being a professional golfer!

3

Last Match Forum - 11/01 AFC Bournemouth (FA Cup 3 - A) / Re: In Game Chat

« on: Yesterday at 03:18:13 PM »

Taylor has to be taller than 6'2. He looks huge

Wikipedia has him as 6'5. I think transfermarkt is wrong

4

Last Match Forum - 11/01 AFC Bournemouth (FA Cup 3 - A) / Re: In Game Chat

« on: Yesterday at 03:15:38 PM »

https://westbrom.com/forum/index.php?topic=22168.msg957030;boardseen#new

To talk about stream issues

5

Last Match Forum - 11/01 AFC Bournemouth (FA Cup 3 - A) / Re: In Game Chat

« on: Yesterday at 03:09:59 PM »

Their manager loves to press, we have to be careful with the ball at the back and go long in behind if needed

6

West Bromwich Albion FC / Re: Next Head Coach Thread

« on: January 09, 2025, 12:44:48 AM »

I'm willing to bet that there will be people on here who start to judge before that. But it's all a bit of a pointless discussion at the moment. It takes as long as it takes and we'll know the choice fairly soon I'm sure (I anticipate the person watching the cup game on Saturday). In the meantime, there's absolutely zilch that any of us can do to speed things up, so really no point in any of us getting our knickers in a twist.

I don't think people are commenting on it because they think it will affect the club, but this is absolutely the place for fans to express any concerns, or not.

7

West Bromwich Albion FC / Re: Next Head Coach Thread

« on: January 08, 2025, 11:07:18 PM »

I don't care about how long it takes if it ensures we get the right manager.

The issue with that, is we can only judge a manager after 10+ games, maybe even more to account for "it not being their squad", or "they need time to have the players adapt" or whatever else you (not actually you) want to say depending on if you are pro or anti the new person.

Football is chaotic and so you have to have good processes in place, and acknowledge sometimes even when you do everything right, it goes wrong. But if you have the correct processes then hopefully you give yourself the best chance of things going right.

I would argue if we take too long then it suggests a problem in the decision-making process. Either we were unprepared for CC going, or we are being indecisive, or there is an internal power-struggle between Nestor and Pearce.

8

West Bromwich Albion FC / Re: Next Head Coach Thread

« on: January 08, 2025, 10:59:08 PM »

As the " how long does it take" debate rumbles on I was wondering what is the latest people would accept as being reasonable for the appointment to be made ?

I would expect someone to be in place by early next week so they have a week to prepare for Stoke. While I am not too bothered by us taking our time, a decision needs to be made one way or the other, and a new head coach will need to have time to assess the squad and if that impacts any transfer plans. I think our squad is reasonably flexible in terms of coping with a back 3 or back 4, so that shouldn't be an issue, but you never know how opinions differ on players.

9

West Bromwich Albion FC / Re: Next Head Coach Thread

« on: January 08, 2025, 03:34:07 AM »

I'm not so sure about Fischer. My albeit brief look at his time at Union Berlin suggests that his 4th place finish was largely due to an extreme over performance in front of goal, wherein they scored 51 goals from an xG of 38. They then underperformed the following season and barely stayed up.

His tactical style seems hard to pin down but looks like it's a back three, and certainly more noted for defensive solidity than great attacking play. That said, if we were in the Premier League I'd expect similar, but we're not.

10

General Football & Sports / Re: OFFICIAL PREMIER LEAGUE THREAD

« on: January 06, 2025, 07:11:09 PM »

Okay 48 hours out.

He's not been sacked yet

West Ham weighing up whether to sack Lopetegui - https://www.bbc.com/sport/football/articles/cy53x316kzgo

11

West Bromwich Albion FC / Re: Next Head Coach Thread

« on: January 06, 2025, 06:13:35 PM »

Wicky would be a gamble bearing in mind his little or no connection with UK football.

If we limit our search to those who have experience in English (or even UK) football, it really narrows who is available and probably also will push their demands up as the English game generally pays more than other leagues.

I have no problem with a manager with little experience of English football because at this point they have half a season risk-free to bed in.

12

West Bromwich Albion FC / Re: Next Head Coach Thread

« on: January 06, 2025, 12:40:51 AM »

Being Swiss, how do you pronounce his name? Vicky?

He's from the German speaking part of Switzerland, so I'd imagine it's with a German accent - probably Vicky

13

West Bromwich Albion FC / Re: Next Head Coach Thread

« on: January 03, 2025, 10:12:26 PM »

Generally, when a search for a new coach occurs whatever club, it is in danger of being relegated and are looking for a new coach with new ideas, systems and injecting new enthusiasm. Our case is the opposite.

We have a reasonable squad base playing decent football with potential automatic promotion and certainly the play-offs and the old adage applies to a degree ‘if it ain’t broke, why fix it’.   Certainly improve it where you can but don’t throw out the successful work previously achieved and try to replace with new coach tactics and systems of which the players are unfamiliar. 

This is the attraction of appointing the current temporary team of Brunt and Abella plus, the financial attraction of not having to pay anyone compensation. 

(As a matter of interest, my vote was for Johnny Heitinga!)

Equally, Brunt is/was loans manager, so wasn't part of the coaching setup, Abella was a stats analyst and Myhill is a goalkeeper coach in the academy (I think), so there's little continuity, really.

We lost Carlos, our goalkeeper coach (Marcos Abad?), Martin Drury and I think two other assistants to Carlos.

14

West Bromwich Albion FC / Re: System / Tactics / Personnel

« on: January 03, 2025, 08:57:04 PM »

Personnel related:

West Brom Xtra
@WestBromXtra


🚨 Understand there is serious interest in Josh Maja and Tom Fellows this window.

West Brom do not want to sell and will want to keep them both for the second half of the season.

@EyaWeGew
 @talkwba
 #wba

No ****!

These so-called ITK accounts do my head in!

15

West Bromwich Albion FC / Re: Caleb Taylor

« on: January 02, 2025, 03:22:05 PM »

"Players may be registered with a maximum of three clubs during one season. During this period, the player is only eligible to play official matches for two clubs. "

Always worth remembering the rules. If Caleb plays for us, he can't play for another team on loan, so we can't bring him back, play him, then loan him out to someone else. Presume we could send him back to Wycombe but that's a grey area for me

16

West Bromwich Albion FC / Re: Mason Holgate joins on loan

« on: January 01, 2025, 09:05:31 PM »

Weird, I think he’s average at best. And has a part to play in a lot of goals we concede.

Surely most centre backs have a part to play in most goals conceded, considering they defend the bit in front of the goal!

17

West Bromwich Albion FC / Re: John Swift

« on: January 01, 2025, 08:55:59 PM »

Fell asleep in a meeting according to himself on Team Rates on Sky Sports YouTube. Also put himself as least likely to become a coach out of himself, Molumby, Mowatt, Grant and Bartley.

18

West Bromwich Albion FC / Re: Next Head Coach Thread

« on: December 31, 2024, 11:28:24 PM »

Correct. I really don't understand the reputation he has when everything he did was abroad and it was apparently revolutionary that he showed his players videos of animals if I remember right.

A failure at Chelsea and now just happy to on his pay off.

There was more to it than that - it was about fostering a bond between players, and while some of the techniques were unusual (getting the players to put on a play), he got Östersund promoted three times and did reasonably well in Europe with them too.

He's tactically aware and his Brighton side played some lovely stuff.

Anywho, he's out of our reach so it's all moot

19

West Bromwich Albion FC / Re: Combined 04/05 + 24/25 XI

« on: December 31, 2024, 03:26:09 PM »

I was just going through the squad for 04/05 and I can't believe how young it is compared to our current squad/recent squads.

I can only see four or five players over the age of 30 - Moore, Campbell, Horsfield, Hoult, Johnson, and Sakiri but he barely played. Scimeca was 29 apparently.

The mainstays of that team were all mid-20s. Clement, Greening, Robinson, Gaardsoe, Gera were all 25 supposedly.

I'm actually quite shocked at how young that team was, and what an achievement it was to stay up

20

West Bromwich Albion FC / Re: Daryl Dike

« on: December 31, 2024, 03:05:07 PM »

Does anyone know the last time a player actually had a "pay as you play" deal?

My understanding is that since all contracts have appearance fees anyway these days, they kind of have died a death? You just have a low (but non-zero) base salary, but it's made up with appearance fees, goal bonuses etc

21

West Bromwich Albion FC / Re: Uros Racic joins on loan

« on: December 31, 2024, 05:00:23 AM »

Good point, i assumed if we got rid of Racic we would have a spot.

Because Heggem is an international now does that his 'score' up or something?

You have to wait a full transfer window after a player has signed before upgrading a player in that manner. As Stan says, that means Heggem would qualify in the summer as the January window has to pass first.

I believe if Racic went back then we could utilise his spot on another player

22

West Bromwich Albion FC / Re: Caleb Taylor

« on: December 30, 2024, 04:29:34 AM »

For people saying it's now or never for him at 22, I disagree.

Centre halves take so much longer to develop than any other outfield position. Dawson was much older before he established himself.

Dawson went on loan to Bolton in the Championship at 22 and meaningfully broke out as a starter at 24. I agree that Caleb isn't at a make/break point yet, but he will be in a season or two, so if those at the club don't think he can make the step up he's better off elsewhere

23

West Bromwich Albion FC / Re: Next Head Coach Thread

« on: December 29, 2024, 03:59:21 PM »

You would hope Nestor have a list of names based on the style and proficiency of the manager, no doubt underpinned with some form of analytics. Given it's a mid-season appointment we probably need someone who plays in a similar fashion to CC, or can at least change things very slowly rather than lurching to a drastically different style.

24

Albion Matchday Forum / Re: In Game Chat

« on: December 29, 2024, 02:25:37 PM »

Rarely does at a corner Droitwich

3% conversion rate when you get a big enough sample size. They're not as dangerous as people think (without doing something a bit different)

25

Albion Matchday Forum / Re: In Game Chat

« on: December 29, 2024, 01:53:33 PM »

Commentary said Damia Abella does a lot of the coaching, anyone know if this is true? Always thought CC was a very hands on coach and led almost everything

Abella's official role was something like First Team Statistical Analyst, but exactly how that plays out will be different at each club. Though CC is very hands-on he has a large group of coaches who will also do a lot.