Back in 2010 the West Midlands was celebrating the fact that for the first time in 27 years it was blessed with four top-flight clubs. Fast forward to the present day and West Bromwich Albion are the region’s only Premier League representatives and, in the eyes of an increasingly frustrated fanbase, not exactly flying the flag with a great deal of pride at the moment.
These are still early days, of course, and, should Albion beat Middlesbrough at home on Sunday afternoon, they will go into the international break with six points from their opening three Premier League matches and everyone could be forgiven for wondering what all the fuss is about. Yet for some supporters there is a bigger picture that is not going to be resolved by one result. The lack of transfer activity at The Hawthorns this summer is one issue. The team’s style of play is another and hand in hand with that is the question of whether Tony Pulis, on the back of one win from 12 matches, is the right man to be in charge.
After Albion’s penalty shootout defeat at Northampton Town in the EFL Cup on Tuesday night the Express & Star conducted an online poll as to whether Pulis should stay on as manager. While it is impossible to tell whether the result provides an accurate gauge of the wider mood – the newspaper reported that seven out of every 10 people who voted wanted the Welshman out – it is clear that unrest is bubbling beneath the surface.
The fact that West Brom will soon be under new ownership, when the Chinese company owned by Guochuan Lai takes control next month, only adds to the overall uncertainty. Lai, who has met Pulis, does not speak English and the feeling within the club is he will lean heavily on the existing senior staff, in particular John Williams, who was brought in as chairman recently and will act as the conduit between the manager and owner.
A well-respected figure during the 14 years he spent working for Blackburn Rovers as chief executive and chairman, Williams has stressed that the priority for Albion is bringing in players to strengthen a squad that has an all-too-familiar look.
Pulis spoke after the victory over Crystal Palace in their opening match of the season about how the club has “almost stagnated” and, in fairness to the manager, he has a point. There is also an argument that Pulis deserves to be judged when a few more new faces have come through the door. As things stand, Matt Phillips is the only permanent signing West Brom have made this summer. Pulis wants five more players in before the window closes on Wednesday.
Funds are in place and have been ever since the transfer budget was approved at a board meeting at the end of last season. Albion are willing to spend big – there is talk inside The Hawthorns that a couple of significant transfers are close – and, if the right player becomes available, prepared to break the club-record £12m they paid for Salomón Rondón last summer. Yet getting deals over the line has proved to be a major problem for a club that is a long way down the pecking order when it comes to where players choose to play Premier League football.
West Brom cannot compete with Southampton or West Ham United for a player, Crystal Palace and Bournemouth are probably more attractive propositions right now and it is perhaps a sign of the times that the club are borrowing fringe players from teams who are unlikely to finish in the top six. Brendan Galloway has joined on a season-long loan from Everton and Albion hope to tie up a similar arrangement with Southampton’s Jay Rodriguez.
All the while a question mark continues to hang over the future of Saido Berahino. Assuming Berahino is still an Albion player when the window closes – this time last year he told Jeremy Peace he would never play for the club’s owner again after he missed out on a deadline-day move to Tottenham Hotspur – nobody can be quite sure what to expect from a striker who is out of contract at the end of the season.
As for Pulis, the doubts were there from day one about whether his relationship with West Brom would work in the long term. Yet in a season that promises to be far from straightforward for the club, it may be no bad thing to have a man in charge who has never been relegated.
