Birmingham City will welcome back five key players for their English Premier League relegation battle against Wigan Athletic on Saturday.Birmingham boss Alex McLeish should be able to call upon defenders Roger Johnson, Martin Jiranek and Stephen Carr, midfielder Barry Ferguson and on-loan striker Obafemi Martins.All five have trained in the past week and their return should provide the team with a boost after an FA Cup quarter-final exit at the hands of Bolton Wanderers in their last match. “We had a right few missing last week and I said at the time if they had played there could have been a danger of them incurring muscle injuries and being out for the next month or even longer,” McLeish said.”It was good for them to get a regeneration of the batteries and also to get some much needed treatment.””Johnson, Ferguson, Carr, Jiranek, Martins all trained today and were declared fit by the medical staff.””(Nikola) Zigic, (Keith) Fahey, (Lee) Bowyer, (David) Bentley did some separate work with the physios so they are the doubts. It is good to get the experienced guys back.”McLeish believes the availability of certain players could dictate whether Birmingham survive in the top flight.”You need to persevere right to the very end but the experience could help as well, could be a factor, and we have that as well,” he said.”It would be nice to get the other players back on track as well … It would be good to have everyone available in the run-in.”McLeish does not expect Wigan to spring any surprises in regards to team selection or tactics at the DW Stadium. “We’ve got a pretty good idea of what side we are going to face,” he said.”(Wigan manager) Roberto (Martinez) will try and get his strongest team out.””We know he can change the system a bit but we know by and large how they are going to play and he will know the same about us.””There are no real secrets in the Premier League.”While a victory over their fellow strugglers would be invaluable, McLeish insists the clash with Wigan is not a must-win game.”There are a lot of big games this weekend and as a league we have come to the real business side of the season,” said McLeish.”We know that winning this game would give us fantastic confidence for the run-in.””If we don’t get the result we are looking for, the league is not finished. There will still be plenty of points to be played for.”
Winger Chris Brunt has signed a new three-year contract with West Bromwich Albion.
The 25-year-old Northern Ireland international is the latest player to pledge his future to the Baggies ahead of their return to the Premier League.
Team-mates Graham Dorrans and Youssouf Mulumbu have recently penned new deals at The Hawthorns and Brunt is delighted to have followed suit.
"I'm delighted to sign this new deal because I feel really settled at the club, just like my family does in the area," he told the club's official website.
"The club is heading in the right direction and this is a nice bonus ahead of what I hope will be a big season both for the team and on a personal level.
"I've won promotion with the club twice now and I want to top that by helping to establish Albion in the Premier League.
"That's the challenge facing the coaching staff and players and if we all pull together I believe we can have a successful season.
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"The fans have been great to me during the past three years and I'm sure they'll get right behind us next season when we will need them more than ever."
Brunt joined the Baggies in a £3million deal from Sheffield Wednesday in August 2007.Subscribe to Football FanCast News Headlines by Email
Spain slipped to an unlikely 1-0 defeat at the hands of Fabio Capello’s under-strength England side at Wembley on Saturday. While England’s limited yet encouraging performance has dominated the back pages, and rightly so, little attention has been paid to the quite frankly petulant response of Spain’s players in the aftermath. Tiki-taka has had fans creaming themselves all over the world for the best part of six years now, and while it is certainly a fantastic way to play if you have the requisite players at your disposal, it is not the only way to play. The eulogising over this style of play has now given way to a warped and bizarre state of affairs by which all over styles of football are measured. A hierarchy has been established, with tiki-taka as its sovereign master.
Barcelona are most football fans second team. When they’re at their best, it’s doubtful that we’ll ever see another team quite like it. In full flow, they are the epitome of what most footballers aspire to. Effective, possession-based football is the Holy Grail; it’s the in-vogue style of the decade.
However, what has begun to irritate me is the fact that most people see victories lessened if they are not done in that very same style. To use an extreme example, if England somehow managed to win the Euro’s playing like they did against Spain for the entire tournament, by that very same token, their victory would be somehow less worthy as it flies in the face of the only apparent accepted footballing principles of our times. This all begs the question, when did we begin to trade substance for style? Or more pertinently, perhaps, when did we begin to rank styles of football based on their aesthetic quality?
Spain’s success at international level has been built primarily around Luis Aragones insistence that they replicate Barcelona’s domestic success, style included, on the international stage. It has worked a treat – Spain are unquestionably the best international side of the last 25 years or so and Barcelona are now arguably the best club side ever. There‘s clearly something to this tiki-taka, then.
But what does bother me, is the way that these footballing deities react when it all doesn’t go their way. Simply because they are sticking to their principles despite it becoming abundantly clear during the duration of the match that their style isn’t working, that they attempt to take the moral high ground. It’s a get-out clause to fall back on in defeat that we’ve seen time and time again.
Cesc Fabregas stated after the England game: “We made England defend nearly the whole 90 minutes. You want teams to have a go at you and test you and see what happens.”
“We saw two completely different styles of football. The more defensive one won but we know that the only way they could score was from a free-kick or a corner and we conceded a not very intelligent free-kick. We paid for it but, basically, we are happy because we played very well.”
For anyone that actually watched the match, Fabregas’s version of events is a generous way of spinning it. Spain lacked penetration, width and invention. They were slow on the counter and were by and large predictable. They were the worst kind of tiki-taka – passing for passing’s sake.
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When Fabregas argues that he wants teams to ‘have a go at you and test you and see what happens’, in lamens terms what he is actually saying is ‘we want them to play openly, because we know that we have the better players, it’ll make us look good and we’ll definitely win.’
Whenever Barcelona or Spain lose, the opposition is always derided for having played ‘negative’ or ‘defensive’ football. But when you consider the quality of the opposition, how the hell else are they supposed to play?
Spain and Barcelona are in possession of some of the best players in the world, in a system that they’ve been trained in for the entirety of their footballing education and subsequent careers. England on the other hand were a side missing arguably their three best players (Rooney, Gerrard and Wilshere, not to mention Ashley Young) while in the midst of experimenting with new players in unfamiliar positions.
To play an openly attacking brand of football without the players necessary to carry it off would have been absolutely brainless (just look at Wigan). England were well within their rights to play defensive football if they felt that it was the best way to go about getting the desired result.
Spain have a fierce commitment to passing football, so much so that it has spawned an ideology practiced and imitated all over the world with varying degree of success. While their style of play is easy on the eye, without the necessary spark like Barcelona have with Lionel Messi, it can become somewhat, dare I say it, boring to watch.
Spain manager Vicente Del Bosque said after the game: “England played very deep and did what they had to and are very physical.” while the deplorable Sergio Busquets offered in direct contrast to the all-knowing Fabregas: “We weren’t expecting England to play so defensively, with 10 behind the ball but we also have to respect that style of play.”
The subtlety of their language cannot fail to portray their patronising tone. England may have been the victors on the pitch, but somehow, amidst all the fawning over their abilities, a degree of faux moralising has crept into football – so much so that Spain will probably see themselves as the real victors of the match because they tried to play football ‘the proper way’, therefore completely contradcting the point of football in the first place – to win.
Spain and Barcelona are both fantastic sides. At their best they exemplify all the best qualities that you’d possibly want from a football team. However, their style of play, as admirable as it may be, is not the only way for a successful side to operate.
Somewhere amongst all the hyperbole we’ve lost our perspective. Part of what makes football an inherently absorbing game is the plethora of contrasting of styles; the beauty of it is that it has no formal hierarchy in terms of accepted principles – a scrappy 1-0 can mean just as much as a 5-0 trouncing.
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The over the top praise often attributed to tiki-taka has distorted the playing field. To decry a style as ‘defensive’ or ’negative’ simply because it contradicts with your own smacks as little more than an excuse trotted out when the likes of Fabregas don’t get their way and steamroller the opposition into submission. Spain and Barcelona are the standard-bearers of our times, however amongst all the mythologising and moralising, it’s worth remembering that to be successful, there are other ways to play the game aside from tiki-taka, as blasphemous as that may sound.
Arsenal face their sternest test of the season when they travel to Barcelona’s Camp Nou in the Champions League on Tuesday.Arsene Wenger’s side exited the competition at the hands of Barcelona in the quarter-finals last season, losing 6-3 on aggregate after a 4-1 defeat in the second leg in Catalonia. They were drawn together again in the round of 16 this year, but Arsenal have already gone one better by recording a 2-1 win in the first leg at the Emirates Stadium on February 16.That narrow victory gave the North London side hope of progressing to the last eight, but since then their season has threatened to derail.They suffered a shock defeat in the Carling Cup final against Birmingham City on February 27, failing to end what is now a six-year drought without a trophy.To make matters worse, key striker Robin van Persie suffered a knee injury at Wembley, ruling him out of the second match against Barcelona. Next came a frustrating 0-0 draw at home to Sunderland on Saturday, a missed opportunity to close the gap on English Premier League leaders Manchester United to just one point. Arsenal’s failure to collect maximum points gained added significance on Sunday, when United were beaten 3-1 away to Liverpool.Influential captain Cesc Fabregas is also suffering from a hamstring injury and while he is expected to be fit for the trip to Spain, it remains to be seen if he will be able to perform at his usual level.Midfielder Alex Song is expected to miss the match after failing to recover from a knee injury he suffered in the Carling Cup final 2-1 loss against Birmingham.”At the moment it doesn’t look like Alex Song will be fit. He’s not been on the field at all,” Wenger said.Although scans have shown only bruising, the swelling is considerable. Song has been one of the few automatic selections in Wenger’s best starting XI over the past two years and his tackling qualities just in front of a central defence already depleted by a long-term injury to Thomas Vermaelen will be keenly missed. Barcelona have won all four of their La Liga matches since being beaten in London, but are not without problems of their own. Gerard Pique picked up a yellow card in the first leg that will rule him out of the return through suspension. His centre-back partner and team captain Carlos Puyol is also out injured, meaning Barca will most likely field either Argentine Gabriel Milito or midfielder Sergio Busquets alongside fullback Eric Abidal as a makeshift defensive pairing. If Busquets is picked at the back, one of Javier Mascherano or Seydou Keita will deputise in midfield. Goalkeeper Victor Valdes returned for Barcelona in their 1-0 home win against Real Zaragoza on Saturday, while Andres Iniesta and David Villa were afforded rests on the bench.
Veteran Manchester United midfielder Paul Scholes believes he has just one more season left in his top-flight career.
Scholes, 35, has been part of the first-team picture at Old Trafford since 1994 and has made almost 650 appearances for the Red Devils.
However, the former England international has revealed he could hang up his boots at the end of next season.
"I am coming to the end of my playing career and I maybe have one year left," said Scholes, who signed a new 12-month contract in April.
"I have started doing my coaching badges back in England and hopefully one day I will be able to coach kids or coach some kind of team somewhere."
Meanwhile, Scholes does not expect long-serving United boss Sir Alex Ferguson to be retiring any time soon.
"It goes without saying what a top manager he has been," he continued.
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"The amount of players he has brought through the youth team is great and it gives hope to all the kids in the youth team that if they are good enough he will definitely use them.
"It has just been fantastic working with him and I think there is a good few years left in him yet."Subscribe to Football FanCast News Headlines by Email
The coming together of Liverpool and Manchester United is one of the Premier League’s titanic clashes and you have the opportunity to watch all the action from the Legends Lounge at Anfield this Saturday lunchtime.
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Manchester United will aim for their 13th successive victory against Wigan when they travel to the DW Stadium on Saturday. Since the Latics were promoted to the Premier League for the first time in 2005, the two sides have met on 12 occasions with Sir Alex Ferguson’s men victorious on every occasion.
They have won 11 league meetings and thumped Wigan in the 2006 Carling Cup Final 4-0, having scored 39 goals in the matches including two 5-0 victories last season. Amazingly, last year’s Premier League runners-up have conceded just four goals to Wigan in those 12 matches and will be keen for another victory to open up a four-point lead on championship rivals Arsenal in the hunt for this season’s title.
With Arsenal not in league action this weekend due to their Carling Cup final meeting with Birmingham on Sunday, the match takes on extra significance and Manchester United striker Wayne Rooney admitted Saturday’s fixture is vital. “There are three massive games for us coming up now, Wigan, Chelsea and Liverpool, and then maybe Arsenal after that in the (FA) Cup,” Rooney said. “It’s a massive time for us in the season and we’ll have to keep going and trying to create chances in those games. If we can get through those games, with a good amount of points, I’m sure we’ll be up there.”
The visitors are likely to make several changes to their side that drew 0-0 with Marseille in a dull Champions League affair on Wednesday, with Ryan Giggs, Paul Scholes and Rafael all in contention to return to the first-team. Rio Ferdinand is still out with a calf injury which he suffered in a shock 2-1 defeat at Wolves, Manchester United’s only league defeat of the season.
Wigan defender Emmerson Boyce revealed that his side were taking inspiration from Wolves’ upset win at Molineux and hopes his side can do the same. “Games like Manchester United are the games you want to play in and are great occasions to experience,” Boyce said. “Wolves showed a couple of weeks ago that United can be beaten, and we fancy our chances of doing the same. People probably won’t fancy us to get anything off United, but Wolves picked up a bonus three points and we need to take heart from that. Anything, even a point, would be a massive boost for our survival chances.”
Wigan, who sit 18th in the Premier League and inside the relegation zone, could drop to the bottom of the table if West Ham and Wolverhampton record victories on the weekend. And with four of their next five fixtures against top-five sides in the Premier League, Roberto Martinez’s side will be desperate to break their losing record against Manchester United and gain at least a point on Saturday.
Prediction: 1-3 – you can get odds of 12/1 with bet365!
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With the World Cup only a few million seconds away- probably- the excitement is now reaching boiling point, especially for those of us who’ve allowed ourselves to get carried away with the idea that England can actually win.
While the dream of seeing Rio Ferdinand lift the coveted trophy in just 40 days time, may be just like the dream I used to have of bedding Pamela Anderson when I was younger- i.e, never going to happen, rather than anything wet, I still can’t help but have a faint glimmer of hope, dare I say even expectation.
It’s at such times that the cynic in me raises his gloomy, pragmatic head and reminds me that not only are England seemingly destined to never win the World Cup in my lifetime but that, along with certain other things are pretty much guaranteed at this summer’s tournament. Here’s a list of ten things that will more than likely happen in the next few weeks.
10. Let’s not drag it out or hide it in the middle or near the bottom, England go out on penalties. There I’ve said it. Despite my overwhelming faith in Wayne Rooney and unshakeable optimism bordering on blind faith, the odds are that England will be eliminated on penalties. I may be wrong and of course I hope I am but as the World Cups of 1990, 1998 and 2006 showed us, not to mention Euro’s 1996 & 2004, the national team’s predilection for penalty elimination in major tournaments has become something of a tradition.
9. A co-commentator/pundit will use the tournament to try and get the job full-time or impress us all and instead merely become very annoying. I remember in 1994 listening to John Fashanu state: “He’s just nutmegged the defender- which is pushing the ball between your opponents legs.” before being thanked by his colleagues for explaining such things to the many people who may be watching football for the first time. There was also the Martin O’Neill; I’m going to get my point across, even if it runs through the second half performance of France ’98. Let’s of course not forget the various Ron Atkinson ’isms’ which lit up Japan and South Korea 2002- on second thoughts, let’s forget all about them. I’m half expecting Ian Holloway to be wearing a fez in the studio banging a tambourine and ‘amusing is all with ‘crazy‘ metaphors- the joker.
8. Maradona will cost Argentina the world cup with a bizarre substitution. I was going to say silly tactical decision but giving the plumped, shaking slightly, Hand of God’s fondness for those it seemed a bit too broad. I expect it to be a substitution that does for the two-time winners. Just as it did in Germany 2006 when Jose Pekerman removed man-of-the-match Juan Riquelme during the quarter-final game against the hosts. The difference between then and now is that Pekerman was by all accounts a sane individual despite making a poor decision, something his successor could never be accused of. Expect Lionel Messi to be dragged off for only hitting the bar with a 30-yard lob, or perhaps Juan Sebastian Veron to be asked to fill in between the sticks following a goalkeeping error, with Maradona in charge- of the team if not his faculties – anything’s possible.
7. There will be no surprise packages. This sounds harsh, after all doesn’t every World Cup have a team that comes from nowhere to get to the quarter-finals or even the semi’s. Okay, you may get an African nation in the last eight, but would that really be a shock? I don’t think the final four of the tournament will be of any great surprise, expect Keaton, McManus, Fenster, Kint, et al to be there- did you see what I did there? In other words, Germany, Spain, Brazil, Argentina-unless Maradona acts quicker than I expect- to all be there or there abouts.
Which leads me onto my next one…
6. Germany will progress further than England. Again I’m listening to my head rather than my heart as I still think we, yes ‘we’ are going to win the World Cup and am so confident have even bet an entire tenner on it, but realistically ‘we’ won’t. Not only that, our former military adversaries- oops don’t mention the ’you know what’ always seem to do better than we do when it comes to the World Cup -unless it’s in England of course, and there’s a Russian linesman. Since the day that everyone over fifty won’t stop going on about, Germany have almost always gone at least one better than us. Mexico 1970’s quarter-final defeat to them was the beginning of a pretty shabby run from England. 1986 we made the quarter-finals they made the final. 1990 we made the semis, they won it. 1998 we made the second round; they made the quarter-finals. 2002 we made the quarter-finals they made the final. 2006.…..you get the point.
Click here to see the TOP 5
5. Emile Heskey will not score a single goal.
4. Peter Crouch will.
3. Nelson Mandela will be shown on the television at least 54 times a day and how far South Africa has come as a nation over the past 16 years will be mentioned at least every 3 minutes by every commentator.
2. A Premier League player will win the Golden Boot. At first this may seem like I’m stating the obvious as due to the fact Ji Sung Park plays in the EPL then there can be no doubt what I’ve said is true. However with Fernando Torres- if he makes it, not to mention Wayne, oh you know the one, Rooney that’s it. Plus Carlos Tevez, Robin Van Persie and Didier Drogba all representing their country, it’s not the most far-fetched notion I’ve ever heard of. Unlike a recent ten pound bet I made earlier.
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1. A single person will be blamed for England’s exit. As far back as I can remember -or even google for that matter, without fail at every major tournament it has been the act of one man that has let this nation down. Sometimes before we’ve even got -or not got- to a tournament, look up Assenmacher if you don’t believe me. It was David Beckham in ‘98, David Seaman in 2002- by some critics, not all I might add, 2006 it was obviously Cristiano Ronaldo for having the temerity to wink after Rooney got sent off. Let’s not forget the Euro’s as well, where we’ve even seen a penalty spot, come under scrutiny for England’s exit. Admittedly you could argue that if Fabio Capello picks the wrong side or whatever, then obviously he’ll be to blame but I’m not talking about that, I’m on about burning effigies of Stephen Warnock for giving away that 93 minute throw-in on the half way line that led to the equaliser. Or perhaps we’ll find ourselves boycotting Spain as a holiday destination because David Villa dived in the box to win a penalty against us. Chances are though it could be some previously unheard of referee who finds himself public enemy number on in England for making a suspect decision which was without a doubt the turning point in our quarter-final game.
Read more of Justin’s work at his excellent blog ‘Name on the Trophy’
Since getting promoted to the top flight in 2007/8, Stoke City have embarked on a project; transforming themselves from relegation favourites into a stable Premier League force. While they will always have their detractors, it may be about time that the somewhat patronising platitudes and plaudits finally heading their way come to an end, for they could be a serious threat to those with Europa League aspirations this term.
Of course, Stoke are already competing in Europe this season courtesy of an FA Cup final appearance last term against Man City, yet people still feel the need to belittle their achievements as merely a blip on the radar before the status quo is rightly resumed.
Whenever an article is written about Stoke praising their progress it is often met with the caveat about their style of play. It’s become an obsession for most that when discussing Stoke (granted, I accept the irony that I may be falling into that very same trap now) that to praise them is to highlight their limitations at the same time. With no other club in the Premier League does this happen.
Under Tony Pulis’s astute leadership Stoke have finished 12th on 45 points, 11th on 47 points and 13th on 46 points. This summer’s heavy spending in the transfer market then can be seen as nothing more than a statement of intent through fear of giving way to stagnation.
Cast your eye around Stoke’s squad now and it’s filled to the brim with Premier League, and in some cases, international quality players. The arrivals of Peter Crouch, Wilson Palacios, Jonathan Woodgate and Matthew Upson this summer all signify a step in the right direction and fittingly for a Tony Pulis signing, they all arrive with a point to prove.
We’ve all fallen into the trap before of praising ‘little old Stoke’ for doing well, but the biggest compliment that you can pay them is that last weekend’s 1-0 defeat of big-spending Liverpool at the Britannia Stadium didn’t come as a surprise. I’ve long been a fan of Pulis’s side and welcome the change for once of a team not merely settling to make up the numbers – see here for further proof of an article I did just over a year ago on the topic – https://www.footballfancast.com/2010/09/football-blogs/fortune-favours-the-brave-for-bold-stoke
Could they emerge as a serious threat to those challenging for a Europa League place this season?
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Most certainly. Spurs are a dishevelled and deeply unsettled side after this summer’s transfer window. Arsenal, while they have strengthened, are susceptible to a challenge and have shown time and time again that they lack the desired mental strength over the course of a long campaign. Liverpool are likely to be inconsistent for the majority of the campaign as they begin to blood new faces. Everton are well and truly skint and a top-half finish would be an achievement in itself for Moyes’s charges and Aston Villa look like a side on the precipice of regression under Alex McLeish.
It’s far from certain, but when you analyse their nearest challengers, Stoke have the most dependable back line out of the aforementioned sides and the least amount of outside pressure on them. They will still struggle to score goals (Cameron Jerome, why?) but they remain difficult to break down and a pain to play.
They’re the model by which future Championship sides will base their first summer in the Premier League on. It seems that only now are they beginning to garner the plaudits that they truly deserve.
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They’ve been labelled as ‘honest’, ‘hardworking’, ‘committed’ and ‘tough’ in the past, but perhaps before we all give way to the worst kind of revisionist thinking, it would be best just to praise Stoke for what they are good at for once, as opposed to judging them for what they aren’t.
West Ham United travel to manager-less West Bromwich Albion for a relegation six-pointer at The Hawthorns on Saturday.
Thu, 10 Feb 2011 13:36:29 +0000
<![CDATA[Former Newcastle boss Chris Hughton appears set to take over from Roberto Di Matteo, who was dismissed by the club after their 3-0 loss to Manchester City last Saturday.
But Hughton’s appointment has not been confirmed and regardless of whether he is appointed before Saturday, caretaker manager Michael Appleton, the first-team coach, will take charge for the hugely-important fixture.
Both sides enter the match in terrible form, with West Brom having won just four of their past 19 Premier League fixtures and West Ham a fraction worse, having won four of 20.
West Brom’s good start to the season increased expectation at The Hawthorns, but Di Matteo could not get his squad to continue their early season form, leading to growing frustration and his eventual dismissal.
In contrast, West Ham started the season terribly but have been slowly improving, having lost just three of their last nine Premier League fixtures.
The likes of Victor Obinna, who has scored five goals in his last three games and January transfer window signings Robbie Keane and Demba Ba have improved results at Upton Park.
When you add the aforementioned trio to the likes of Carlton Cole and Frederic Piquionne, West Ham possess the quality up front to stay up.
But the Hammers will have to stop conceding so many goals, with the fact that they have kept just three clean sheets all season confirming their defensive frailty. Unbelievably, West Brom have only kept one.
The reverse fixture earlier this year ended in a 2-2 draw with Spanish defender Pablo Ibanez rescuing a point for West Brom with his 71st minute equaliser at Upton Park.
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West Ham will be missing several first-team regulars, with Keane, Matthew Upson and James Tomkins all unlikely to feature, while German midfielder Thomas Hitzlsperger will continue his stint on the sidelines.
West Brom are not as hampered with injury, with Marek Cech the only regular to be in doubt with a groin strain.
The results of this fixture will have huge implications, with West Ham having the potential to exit the relegation zone with a win, while West Brom can climb as high as 14th if they manage to get all three points.