Baggies have belief in the impossible dream
BATTLING West Brom kept their slim survival hopes alive with Monday’s deserved 3-0 win over Southampton at The Hawthorns.
The second-bottom Baggies closed the gap to Premier League safety to eight points with seven games left.
Matheus Pereira’s penalty and goals from Matt Phillips and Callum Robinson gave Albion their biggest league win of the season.
They ultimately avoided controversy after Mbaye Diagne had an early header ruled out when VAR was unable to get the right angle to conclusively show the striker’s upper body was on or offside.
The Baggies have also scored eight goals in their last two games, two more than they had managed in their previous 11 combined.
They were great value for this win, in what was arguably their most complete performance of the season.
What can they achieve in the remaining matches? It’s Leicester next at the King Power next week followed by a trip to Villa Park on the Sunday evening. Here are the talking points.
n Bold move
Head coach Sam Allardyce could quite easily have made a case to reinstall Conor Gallagher to the side. He could have opted for the back three again, after Dara O’Shea pulled through after hobbling off at Chelsea.
Yet the boss was bold, giving Robinson a first start since February 2 and setting up his side in an attack-minded 4-2-3-1 system. It certainly paid dividends.
Robinson, Pereira, Phillips and Diagne were a joy to watch in the final third as they combined to great effect and caused Saints all sorts of problems.
It shows Albion have the weapons in their arsenal with which to attack teams. Meanwhile, two fixtures in the side for the most part of the season – Gallagher and Semi Ajayi – face a wait to get back in having done little wrong.
Arteta reminder
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This was Ainsley Maitland-Niles’ best performance in an Albion shirt – against the side who came close to signing him themselves in the January window.
It has been well documented that AMN chose The Hawthorns over St
Mary’s because he would be guaranteed an opportunity to play regularly in his favoured central midfield role.
He’s been quite up and down in recent weeks in terms of performance levels, but here it was a rounded display. He is clearly a very intelligent footballer and has quick feet to match.
That, and his energy which carried him around the pitch, proved to be vital contributions to Albion’s cause here. Even when he took an almighty whack at the end, having fallen awkwardly, he soldiered on.
This acted as a reminder to Mikel Arteta and Arsenal that midfield is where Maitland-Niles belongs.
Bragging rights
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Inevitably you now look ahead. What do Albion have on the horizon, as they look to maintain the unlikeliest of survival missions? Well, immediately, there’s another rather frustrating wait.
It’s a ten-day period between the battering of Southampton and their trip to Leicester, who take on the Saints at Wembley in the FA Cup semi-finals this weekend, so while the Baggies will have extra time to prepare for that encounter, Allardyce would quite like his side – champing at the bit – to have played sooner.
Beyond the trip to the King Power Stadium – a ground Albion have never posted a defeat at – they have further Midlands derbies with Aston Villa and Wolves.
While it now appears unlikely that either side could relegate Albion in the most nightmarish of circumstances which many supporters would have been fearing, they are unlikely to do their neighbours any favours, either.
A seven-to-nine-point haul from those three games and Albion could really be cooking with gas!