The Grandest of Mediocrity

Norwich City F.C. 4-0 WBA

match text commentary
this was, without a doubt, the worst performance of the season by west brom. steve clarke (quite rightly) wanted to have a look at what he's got in terms of players who haven't seen much time in the squad this year - most notably markus rosenberg - and being free to experiment, he used his side's safe position in the table as an opportunity to have a look at some different attacking formations.

what had been a resounding success away to southampton a few weeks ago was an unmitigated failure on this visit to carrow road. fair enough. the gaffer could see this and made the appropriate adjustments going into the second-half. with his side still only down one-nil to kevin snodgrass' early goal, the baggies got back in the game and looked the better side for the first few minutes after the restart. that's when tragedy struck and put getting a result beyond the baggies on the day.


ben foster, coming well off his line in trying to make what would otherwise have been a routine clearance, missed the ball altogether and allowed grant holt to walk it into an open net to put city up by two goals.

in foster's defence, he may have been distracted by jonas olsson's clumsy backtracking, as his centre-half appeared to be moving into a position that threatened to close down the goalie's clearance. whoever is to blame for the amateurish mistake, it knocked the heart out of the albion. unlike the two previous matches - both good performances at the attacking end, if not the best defensively - the baggies quickly became inept in attack and their play going forward tentative. they went on to overcook every ball played into the opposition penalty area and created nothing for themselves in the way of opportunity to get back in the game.

the four-nil scoreline didn't so much reflect how good the home side had been, but rather how poor the baggies were on the day. although there is still an outside chance that the baggies will get a result when they close out the season against manchester united on the last day of the season, i wouldn't bet on it and standard logic would tend to dictate that their best opportunity for reaching the stated goal of achieving 50 points in the league table has now passed them by.

Manchester City F.C. 1-0 WBA

match text commentary
with the best of intentions, steve clarke forgot that supporters generally aren't interested in evaluating resources or even being entertained by attractive football; they want results regardless of the circumstance. even if we have now been able to determine that markus rosenberg just might be a worthwhile footballer, or the gaffer learned an important lesson about when to make substitutions, nothing will make up for failing to get an expected result.


by and large, football supporters want to hear the final whistle the moment that their team has gone ahead in a match. never mind that a game of association football is supposed to be decided over a full 90 minutes of play. if their side goes ahead in the first five minutes, the average supporter would be happy if the contest ended right then and there.

if steve clarke had any doubts as to the matter, a quick listen to any of the rabid and raving critiques delivered in thick black-country dialect on tom ross' post-game radio show after the away fixture with norwich, he would have unquestionably been put right as to what is expected of himself and his team.

whether he listened in or not, the gaffer has got the point and stated to the local media in birmingham that the baggies will be going back to basics for the season finale at home to the league champions.

WBA 2-3 Wigan Athletic F.C.

match text commentary
there probably wasn't a better game of football played in the PREMIER LEAGUE this week than west brom's home fixture with wigan. as per usual, the lancashire side were going for yet another one of their trademark end-of-season "great escape" routines - a situation that has inspired them to some top form football in the past - making a match with wigan athletic a perilous proposition for anyone coming up against them in the league at this time of year.


however, coming off a big win at saints, the baggies looked ready for the challenge and wigan actually played some of the most mediocre football that they have in weeks. it still didn't matter in the end. as exciting as the baggies were going forward, they were still subject to some slack defending on set-pieces (a problem all season) and even when the draw looked an inevitability, wigan found a way to get a late winner and keep their hopes for yet another top-flight survival run alive for yet another week.

the latics' best player on the day was without a doubt shaun maloney. the veteran mid-fielder was key in the creation of wigan's last two goals, and if they don't manage another "great escape" then he's someone who will probably see considerable interest from several top-flight clubs, any one of which who would do well in acquiring his considerable personal skill.

Southampton F.C. 0-3 WBA

match text commentary
while for the past three seasons the baggies have suffered a loss of form that starts just around christmas and carries through until february when they go on a bit of a tear and manage to survive the PREMIER LEAGUE quite comfortably, they have stuttered a little this year. however, with an adventurous setup that included three attacking forwards, it seemed as though they had finally made the breakthrough with this trip to the south-coast.


all three of the starting forward line scored, and while this was somewhat of a sacrifice at the defensive end of the pitch, they still managed a clean sheet and we were rewarded with one of the baggies' best all-round performances of the year.

this was an extremely important result and keeps the baggies on course for the 8th place finish which the team has been building towards since just before christmas. while wins have been hard to come by for west brom since then, their contemporaries in the league haven't done any better with swansea, norwich, newcastle, fulham, west ham and stoke all having similar difficulties in producing a full three-point result in fixtures played over the last five or six weeks. of course, the top TV pundits will quote all the key statistics as evidence of the relatively poor quality of this year's almighty, bloody PREMIER LEAGUE. for the rest of us - that is, supporters of the aforementioned clubs - will be more concerned about our sides keeping pace with their contemporaries in the league and out of the relegation battles. for the moment, that'll probably be good enough.

Norwich City F.C. 0-1 WBA

match text commentary




it was unusual to be sure. although i have seen the baggies win ugly matches, making use of egregious tactical transgressions before, i still thought that this was out of character for a roy hodgson side. still, it's clear that the gaffer favours a consciously more defensive style of play away from home, and, for better or worse, his tactics won out on the day.

peter odemwingie - and like shane long had against chelsea - put the baggies ahead in the first few minutes. they played the rest of the match as a rear-guard action with plenty of physical aggression on both sides.

the winning goal came in the 2nd minute, and developed from a long ball sent in by nicky shorey on the half-way line. the delivery was just beyond norwich defender, ritchie de laet, who was hopelessly turned and trying desperately to head the ball away from the albion striker, peter odemwingie. but the nigerian pounced, having the pace to beat de laet and cleverly directed his effort past the goalie with a deft flick of his left boot.

the baggies then gave norwich city the bulk of possession, defended their lead and remained set up to break on the counter attack. it quickly showed that this might not have been the greatest idea, as the canaries first - and perhaps best - chance of the match came in the 8th minute.





grant holt and andrew surman linked up with a well-worked give and go passing move that split the albion defence and allowed a low hard cross from surman to come in at the baggies' 6-yard box. in the end, it was only a matter of inches as holt put the ball just wide of the goal at the near post.

however, aside from a good shot at the edge of the albion penalty area by midfielder, elliot bennett, there was very little to test ben foster in the albion goal. the gaffer's tactical game came off and the baggies were finally up and running with their first points of the season.

while the canaries had the better part of the possession in the match overall, there was no doubt as to who was creating the better chances and controlling the game. peter odemwingie, along with strike partner shane long, was getting into space up front and moving the baggies into dangerous counter attack positions all day. graham dorrans fashioned a chance from nothing when a 20 yard strike came booming back off the post, having norwich goalie, declan rudd, well beaten; and the young keeper needed to be sharp on several occasions to prevent the baggies from going 2 goals up.

by contrast, ben foster was hardly bothered at all and had a fairly quiet afternoon.

there were two talking points of note. first, the albion were awarded what was shown to be in the video replays a rather "soft" penalty. stephen reid got on the end of a long cross in the canaries penalty area. with norwich striker, steve morison, on his back, trying to make the challenge, reid went down and won the decision for the albion.





it was probably justice served though, as graham dorrans, the usual albion penalty taker, had just come out of the game, peter odemwingie stepped up to take and rudd made a good save on what was ultimately a mediocre effort. the nigerian's strike was well on target, but his placement was poor. the canaries' goalie had guessed direction correctly and the save was simple, solid and athletic. still, it seems, the baggies continue to struggle occassionally with spot kicks.

the point of real controversy in this match was an apparent foul by gabriel tamas - presumably in retaliation for an earlier incident - in which he elbowed norwich substitute, james vaughn full on in the face in the west brom penalty area.

while it was well disguised by the romanian centre-half and looked like incidental contact at first glance - with a norwich player suddenly and spontaneously going down in the box well away from the ball - and for little apparent reason. however, under closer scrutiny it looked pretty bad, and from the evidence of the video replays tamas will probably be charged by the FA. it was a stupid foul and the baggies were lucky to get away with it and hang on for all 3-points.





with clear precedent for this kind of disciplinary action, it's a fair bet that tamas will be charged retroactively with "violent conduct" and forced to accept a 3 game ban. even though he has the support of his manager and club, that is largely a rhetorical exercise, and all concerned know that it is never a good idea to contest an FA disciplinary charge and risk possible extension of the ban.

the baggies have already played better and lost this year and i shall hope future performances are of a higher quality than this. however, it was significant that they kept a clean sheet and were able to protect a lead over the better part of 90 minutes. more importantly it showed that even on an off day, this particular albion side is capable of winning through adhering to specified tactics and keeping it tight at the back. while the canaries held the balance of possession they rarely looked like scoring, and the less frequent forays in attack by the baggies were creating the only real chances of the match.

it wasn't pretty, and at times was down-right nasty, but the win gets the season under way after a rough start; and today, that seems good enough.