Jerome Thomas' appeal to Albion fans

Winger Jerome Thomas has appealed for Albion fans to keep the faith as they reeled from their opening-day hammering at Chelsea.

Thomas, who was the Baggies' star man on a disappointing day, insisted they will learn from their 6-0 defeat at Stamford Bridge in time for Saturday's crucial Hawthorns clash with Sunderland

He said: "The fans have to stay behind us. Negative energy isn't going to help and we didn't go out planning to lose.

"We are going to have to pick ourselves up and hopefully we can put a performance in on Saturday.

"It was a harsh scoreline but you make mistakes and you get punished at this level, especially against a team like Chelsea with the calibre of player that they have. Hopefully we will learn from that and tweak little things to make sure we don't make the same mistakes in future.

"The lads will be fine. We've got a good bunch of players and no-one is too down. We're all going to be disappointed but there is no time to dwell on it.

"It's the first game of the season and there are many more to go."

Fellow midfielder Chris Brunt also called on Albion to put the Stamford Bridge defeat behind them - and admitted blame for the crucial second goal.

Brunt and defender Gabriel Tamas left a gap in the wall that allowed Didier Drogba's free-kick into the net in first-half stoppage time.

And Brunt said: "A couple of us turned slightly and split the end of the wall. I hold my hands up for that one because I was partly to blame.

"I don't even know why we would do it, and coming to places like Chelsea you can't really afford to make mistakes like that.

"We made a mistake there and it was a basic one as well. You want to make teams like Chelsea work for a win and giving away our first three goals from set-pieces made it easy for them.

"A defeat is a defeat but the 6-0 scoreline makes it look like an absolute thumping but I don't think it was.

"Three goals from set-pieces absolutely killed us, but Chelsea away isn't going to be the game that keeps us in the Premier League so we have to look past it."