West Brom comment: Good work done but Baggies need goals
As we enter the final few hours of the transfer window, Albion still have plenty of work to do.
After the opening day victory over Nottingham Forest, Slaven Bilic said he wanted four new faces before today’s 5pm deadline.
There are deals in the pipeline. Grady Diangana is set to join on loan from West Ham after Bilic used his contacts with his former club to hi-jack Derby’s deal for the 21-year-old winger.
Matheus Pereira is also set to join on loan from Sporting, adding further strength to the flanks currently occupied by Matt Phillips and Kyle Edwards.
But the crucial addition will be up front, where the goalscorer the Baggies have desperately needed for weeks, is yet to be found.
Both Bilic’s first game at The Hawthorns and his first competitive game in the Championship were promising.
Albion outplayed Premier League side Bournemouth in their final pre-season friendly and were in control for the majority of last weekend’s match at the City Ground.
But they failed to score against the Cherries and required two goalkeeping errors to find the net against Forest.
Thanks to shrewd acquisitions like Semi Ajayi – who looks a steal at £1.5million – and Sawyers, a classy operator capable of controlling midfield, the Baggies have assembled an encouraging squad behind the front-line.
But £8million signing Kenneth Zohore desperately needs support up top, where goals look in short supply.
This is in complete contrast to last season, when a top-heavy Albion got away with unconvincing football behind a predatory strike-force. Gayle, Rodriguez and Harvey Barnes scored 54 league goals between them last season.
Albion’s business so far may have been shrewd, but it won’t replace that.
Sawyers is not a goalscorer, he netted eight times in 135 games for Brentford.
Neither is Zohore, who scored nine times when he helped Cardiff win promotion out of this league.
Filip Krovinovic, Albion’s exciting no.10, is also best described as a creator.
The Croatian playmaker has 18 career goals in 127 league appearances. It’s fanciful to expect him to notch that in a season.
Hal Robson-Kanu and Oliver Burke may chip in with a few, but they too, cannot be relied on to replace the predatory instinct Gayle and Rodriguez showed.
At the start of the week, Albion were also looking at centre-halves. They were sniffing around Goncalo Cardosa, who ended up at West Ham, and Real Sociedad’s Raul Rodriguez Navaz.
But that is no longer a priority and the final hours of the window will be spent on finding a striker.
The Baggies desperately need to ease the burden on Zohore. Bilic, who is keen on a reunion with Gayle, has been making the point for weeks.
Whether it’s a last-ditch attempt to prise Gayle away from Newcastle or a last-minute attempt to unearth a gem from the foreign market remains to be seen. But it’s imperative a striker is signed, because it could be the difference between promotion and another year in the Championship.
