Sam Allardyce And Rafa Benitez
West Brom’s efforts to remain in the Premier League extend beyond the playing squad, Sam Allardyce has pointed out.
Sam Allardyce said “I have some great coaches here and back room staff that are pulling the way I want them to pull. It has been a case of lifting everyone’s standards and that includes the backroom staff. I have asked the back room staff to lift their own standards – the staff that work with me, who have always worked with me, know my standards anyway. Every staff member behind the scenes has been asked to lift their standards which helps lift the standards of the players. If they deliver a better service then the players get better quality and we get more capable at providing the players with the right information to go out and achieve a result. The players seem to have responded to that, but keeping the spirits up means that points have to follow and that is why I am so disappointed we didn’t get a point at West Ham. We have to face facts, there is no doubt the next game is massively difficult – against Manchester City. They are the top form team in the league and if we are to get a point like we did at their place, that would be magnificent. That should be a point that is added to the ones we should get – and we should have got a point at West Ham. Man City will be difficult but having had a week for it is a good thing for me, but there are two things in the week, one getting ready for Manchester City and one finding new players. After we finish with the players we will be hell-bent, me and Luke [Dowling], on finding players to come in and help this squad get better.”
In what is a difficult environment amid intensive Covid protocols at the club’s Walsall training ground, Allardyce and his assembled coaching staff are working tirelessly to improve Albion’s fortunes on the pitch – and he is ‘hell-bent’ on adding signings off of it. Allardyce has asked his staff, not only the coaches but everyone based at the training ground, to raise their levels to best support the players as they in turn look to produce the adequate results in the second half of the season which will allow them to mount a survival challenge. It’s the small matter of Manchester City next who, while they’ll be without Kevin De Bruyne and Sergio Aguero, are in searing hot form and are now the odds-on favourites to reclaim the Premier League title. Albion will do well to have added to their points tally come 22:15 on Tuesday evening, but they can take heart from what they pulled off in the reverse fixture last month.
