West Bromwich Albion 2 - Queens Park Rangers 1

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Ratings submitted so far: 13

Brendan Clegg:

A win there which I felt we deserved and which became entertaining when it opened up in the second half but was a difficult slog of a watch before played out by a couple of pretty poor sides.

Our starting 11 certainly looked ‘rotated’ but Wildsmith kept his place, and there were audible boos from the sparse crowd for the manager and quite a few other names.

And in the first half we struggled. We had the ball a fair bit but the quality was poor. I don’t recall us engineering a shot at goal that worked the keeper in open play.

Often our possession or attacks broke down on the right where the combination of Campbell (absolutely a trier but technically really limited) and SIJ (young and all left foot) were rushed and haphazard.

MJ, playing in the 10, could not get into it as we moved it slowly or coughed it up cheaply either from our keeper or defence chipping it up to Heggebø against a defender a good 7 or 8 inches taller who pocketed him all night. MJ’s response was to stroll around being petulant and generally I thought our movement off the ball was poor.

The good and bad of set pieces were probably fitting - we scored one with Campbell bundling in from close range and most people assuming the ref would give a foul on the keeper. The cheers were notably muted. Styles hit a few decent corners to be fair.

We conceded from what looked like a soft free kick, which was turned in via deflection and which looked like we’d switched off in what felt like the only time QPR got forward.

A drab opening 45 out of the way and QPR made us wait for a restart.

Again I can’t recall much life in it until MJ hit a great free kick into the box and Phillips thumped a header home.

After that I thought the game was entertaining even if the quality was low. Grant and MJ giving us pace on the break and generally QPR being so bad as to gift us the ball in good situations. What looked like a decent goal was flagged for offside and we didn’t quite have enough quality to get another.

At the back, whenever we looked in trouble it seemed like Phillips got a block in.

The subs of Maja and Price for MJ and Heggebø were booed but both looked leggy, and their freshness did help us see it out. I thought Grant and Campbell also looked absolutely knackered by the end.

We held on and got a win. Not through tactical genius or great play, but because this league is absolutely honking and we got served up an opponent even worse than Bristol - a low bar.

Swansea gives us a real chance to stop our away rot and go and get a back-to-back result but it won’t change how bad we are or how utterly uncoached we look outside of attacking set pieces which have seen a notable improvement. Occasional results, doing just enough and accepting it, is how we drifted for so many years in the Championship before Megson and Thompson demanded more.

• Wildsmith - 6 not much to do, kicking to Heggebø was rubbish
• Campbell - 6 effort but looks after the ball like it’s a grenade
• Phillips - 7 best display in a while, attacked everything
• Taylor - 6 Eyebrows raised but he looked much more comfortable here not having to run/open up… and Mepham needs a right kick up the arse so fair enough
• Styles - 6 Usual energy… there was a weird bit at the start of the second half where he kept sprinting up as our highest man for a ball over the top. It never came.
• Diakité - 6 broke things up steadily but usual frustrations on the ball. He just needs to learn to give it quickly and simply every time
• Mowatt - 6 usual ticking over. There was one 50-50 where he looked like all his joints needed oiling before he could sprint to it.
• SIJ - 6 I’m not for booing a kid being played out of position, even a Villa one. Struggled but kept going.
• MJ - 6 another assist, better as it opened up, didn’t work as hard as he might’ve
• Grant - 7 slogged away, got us up the pitch, that he’s consistently one of our better players tells you where we are at. Playing for the last decent contract of his career I’d imagine.
• Heggebø- 5 no service, looks shagged

• Maja and Price - 5 both ran about. Felt like a game for Dike tbh
• Molumby - 6 kept it simple