WHY A PARD REIGN'S GONNA FALL
Baggies to pull off a Great Escape? Forget it. There were outplayed by Huddersfield team that had more belief, more fight & more unity
WEST BROM 1 Dawson 64 HUDDERSFIELD 2 Van La Parra 48, Mounie 56
TOGETHERNESS, trust and belief in each other.
Those are the qualities likely to keep Huddersfield in the Premier League against all forecasts and logic.
West Brom have none of these qualities.
Their response to a game billed as a “must-win” to have any chance of saving their skins was weak.
A repeat of the Baggies’ great escape of 2005, featured in all its jubilation on the front of the West Brom matchday programme? Forget it.
Manager Bryan Robson led his team from the front that season, particularly in the final-day win over Portsmouth that took West Brom from bottom to 17th.
This Albion team is just not up to it.
Against a Huddersfield side still learning how to play in the Premier League, West Brom cruised more than Jane McDonald. Gareth Barry was booed by his own fans when he was subbed, manager Alan Pardew was ridiculed, his decision not to play Chris Brunt from the start questioned and the ground emptied when Albion went two down.
Pride is a big quality in China, heads can role because of it, as chairman John Williams and chief executive Martin Goodman found two weeks ago when West Brom’s Chinese owner Guochuan Lai sacked them as his club wallowed in danger.
Manager Tony Pulis was dismissed in November and Pardew, on Williams’ and Goodman’s advice, brought in.
You can see where this is going. Guochaun is no pushover and he is not slow to act.
Pardew, with one win in 14 games in 90 days at Albion and with a personal record of seven wins in his last 50 league games, didn’t hang around after this fourth successive league defeat.
He did the post-match TV, radio and newspaper interviews he was obliged to and walked off, not offering, as is usual, a more detailed debrief in a private room just off the media centre at The Hawthorns. Pardew might be interested in what Huddersfield manager David Wagner had to say in that same private room.
“I think we’re in a very good position,” said Wagner, who was playing Brentford, Burton and Preston 12 months ago.
“We have some advantages and our biggest advantage is our togetherness and our trust and belief in each other.
“From day one when we met up in pre-season we have known what it’s all about. It’s about fighting and working to stay up. We never had anything else in our heads.” In the meantime, West Brom have gone from a safe and sound, if boring, club to one in chaos. Goals from Rajiv van La Parra, to rub salt into West Brom wounds a former Wolves player, and Steve Mounie in eight minutes after half-time, sorted out the winners from the losers.
Brunt’s late appearance made a difference, providing the corner from which Craig Dawson scored.
But it’s one win in 26 Premier League games now. Trace the fall further back and it’s four wins in 40 – from eighth to hopeless in a year.
West Brom stopped playing when they were riding high under Pulis and they have not re-started.
They have no-one as good as Alex Pritchard, bought by Wagner for £10million from Norwich last month, while Pardew was bringing in injury-prone Daniel Sturridge to give the physios something to do.
Huddersfield are away to Tottenham on Saturday, playing at Wembley where they won the play-off final to get this Premier League prize.
“I”m excited about going back,” said Wagner.
“This is the place where we had our biggest success, where everything came true. Wembley is one of the greatest occasions to play football.”
West Brom look destined for Millwall.