fbpx
Connect with us

Championship

Carlos Corberan and Mark Robins react to controversy as West Brom beat Coventry

Carlos Corberan and Mark Robins react to controversy as West Brom beat Coventry 2-0 in Monday night’s Championship fixture.

Goals from Grady Diangana and Brandon Thomas-Asante helped the Baggies move up to fifth in the table with 23 points from 24 games, while the Sky Blues are 20th with 15 points from 14 games, six points above the drop zone.

Coventry had a penalty claim not given on 11 minutes, before Grady Diangana put West Brom ahead shortly after with his second goal in as many games, with the help of a glaring error from Coventry goalkeeper Ben Wilson.

Haji Wright somehow missed a glorious chance to level early on in the second half, before substitute Brandon Thomas-Asante made it two in the second half, despite appearing to have strayed offside in the build-up, punishing Coventry’s failure to score from any of their 15 shots.

Coventry’s Mark Robins said as per Sky Sports:

“They started brightly and we didn’t get on top of that until we were a goal down and then they drop away and only come after us when we are trying to play out. It’s been a feature of our games for the last few; Bristol City was one, Rotherham midweek last week and then tonight again, where we’ve been in the game, created good chances and just not taken them.

“That’s the consequence of having a new group and just working through. And always, you get teething problems and you get issues. I’ve just said to the players to not let this affect their confidence. It looks like we need a little bit of a boost, but, ultimately, that’s only going to come through hard work and we need to carry on.”

Robins added, as per Coventry Live:

“The negative bit is the result. There are always some negatives bits in games but we have got to a situation where we have lost the last three and conceded poor goals, really poor goals, by making some poor decisions. But we had plenty of the ball and got into good areas, but what I would say is we need to be more positive when we have got in those positions to shoot because that brings frustration anyway. I was frustrated on the side.

“They blocked and they worked really hard. They started brightly and put us under a bit of pressure to start with but then we made a mistake and it ends up in the back of our net. And sometimes you get those situations.

“So we conceded a really poor goal and their second one is off-side, but we were in the game. We are creating chances and missing some opportunities, so belief is a little bit lacking in certain individuals. But we made some really strange decisions as well, tactically, because we are chasing the game and it’s in the guise of, ‘we’re trying to win the game so I need to do this,’ but you don’t. We needed to stay in a structure and keep building.”

More on the first goal, he said: “It’s poor. We can’t give people chances like that and expect to keep the ball out of the back of the net. It’s poor. We all make mistakes and it’s how you deal with those and put them right as we move forward.

“We were in the game sufficiently enough, We moved the ball pretty well and played through the midfield area pretty well but there are areas where we need to be better. That’s what I would say.”

On the second goal, Robins said: “I saw it live and it looked off-side, and then I looked at the monitor and it was off-side. VAR would have changed it but then the action that led to it… We tried to play off-side and then it was off-side.

“I thought there were some decisions that went against us tonight, and they will feel the same, but that was a major decision because we were still in the game and had some chances to equalise, having gone a goal down. The main one fell to Haji where he was put through from a mistake from them and we didn’t punish them.

“There were some really good signs and good things we did in the game but, clearly, we can’t concede goals that mean it’s a mountain to climb.”

West Brom’s Carlos Corberan via Sky Sports:

“I saw a game where we had to work a lot to get a positive result. We knew that it would be like this; the fact that no team has won here [this season] shows how difficult it is to come and win in Coventry. I asked the players for two things before the game: one was resilience because we know they have players with a lot of quality, especially with the first 11 they put out, with a lot of playmakers.

“The second key for me was personality to attack. In the first minutes of the first half, we showed a lot of personality, we dominated the game and put the game in the attacking half, but after we scored, we started to drop and we were suffering too much.

“The strength of Coventry was to attack and we had to compensate for this in two ways: defending well and attacking more. With the passing of the minutes, we adapted better to the circumstances of the game, to the advantage they were using.”

Carlos said as per Birmingham Live: “The result of course was excellent. We know that Coventry is one team that didn’t lose at home so far, during the game we realised how difficult it was to win here tonight.

“The first goal was a collective action, Grady was showing how connected he is with the game because normally not every player will go for the second ball.

“The second was a very good action, very good pass of (Matt) Phillips, good running of Asante and the level of finish was excellent.

“I am very pleased to have the three points for the level of effort the players have put into the game tonight. In defence in the first half we need to defend much better. In attack we need to attack more, in the second half we improved in the counter attack but there are still things we need to do better to improve as a team.

“I didn’t watch the action (possible offside) so it’s impossible for me to make any decisions. You need to pause, to see with VAR to make the decision but on live, some actions are impossible.

“I think in one action if there is a clear offside it’s easy to see, if there is no clear offside it’s very difficult, and if there is no clear offside there is no advantage. I think VAR shows us sometimes that they disallow the goals in the action that you don’t see an advantage of the striker with the position of the defender.

“If there was an advantage I think the referee would have been watching. I hope it wasn’t offside because I always like to win with the results being fair.”

Yellow cards: Nathaniel Chalobah, Cedric Kipre, Milan van Ewijk, Kyle Bartley, Liam Kitching, Okay Yokosulu, Erik Pieters

Goals: Grady Diangana, Brandon Thomas-Asante

Attendance: 23,971 (1,810)

Sky Blues Xl: Ben Wilson (GK); Bobby Thomas (62’ Latibeaudiere), Kyle McFadzean (C), Liam Kitching; Milan van Ewijk (62’ O’Hare), Ben Sheaf, Josh Eccles, Jay Dasilva; Jamie Allen (74’ Godden), Tatsuhiro Sakamoto, Haji Wright (74’ Simms).

Subs: Brad Collins (GK), Jake Bidwell, Luis Binks, Joel Latibeaudiere, Callum O’Hare, Bradley Stretton, Yasin Ayari, Ellis Simms, Matty Godden

West Brom Xl: Alex Palmer (GK); Pipa, Kyle Bartley, Cedric Kipre, Erik Pieters, Matt Phillips; Jed Wallace (C), Nathaniel Chalobah (53’ Thomas-Asante), Okay Yokusulo, Alex Mowatt, Grady Diangana.

Subs: Josh Griffiths (GK), Darnell Furlong, Jayson Molumby, Conor Townsend, Caleb Taylor, Brandon Thomas-Asante, Harry Whitwell Reyes Cleary.

Here’s what fans had to say as Carlos Corberan and Mark Robins react to controversy after West Brom beat Coventry…

@superman_R6: Whoever does the officials selecting for Cov games really must hate us 😭 Poor sakamoto must think he’s come to a league with no rules 😅 Bloke get torn limb from limb every week to no avail . Haji given offside twice when he’s clearly on. Penalty denied. Never changes #PUSB

@PaulWoods85: Offside, penalty shouts, but generally we just can’t score. Saka & Van Ewijk looked great though. Wilson made a mistake, shit happens. We’ll get there. #PUSB

@TomShanley1992: One of them nights .. haven’t got the rub of the green again ! Decisions have gone against us .. another day that’s offside and Haji misses an absolute sitter ! Played some very good football .. lacking in confidence big time !!

@nattiecw: Absolutely shocking officials tonight. An obvious penalty and Baggies second goal was offside. However we did not take our chances again. Hadji is a real worry as he is missing sitters. I hope he comes good soon. Thought Milan and Jay played better today and Tats is fab. #PUSB

@david_johnst: Clearly offside terrible error by linesman just cannot get any luck

@Puds5ie: Fine margins. Blatant penalty, blatant offside. Awful mistake by Wilson, awful miss by Haji. Penalty given, go 1-0 up different game. That’s how it as the moment. Long,long way to go. #PUSB

@TDC1991: Goalkeeper error for 1st goal and offside for 2nd. One of those. Results will start coming soon

@BlazeHome: Two big decisions that went against us. On another day we’d have got a penalty in the first half and West Brom’s second goal would have been flagged offside. Things just aren’t going our way at the moment but it will get better. #PUSB

@wattlereptile: I’m as disappointed as most. But let’s not forget, penalty not given, 2nd goal offside, and deflected shot from a handball in the box. Officials were a disgrace. #PUSB

@JakeRuss1000: In know its easy to blame the officials, but we’ve had a clear cut penalty denied and that was offside. For a league of this standard, the officiating is absolutely fucking abysmal.

@mrdjmasters: Dreadful ref. Stonewall pen and second a foot offside. BUT, another dreadful performance from City. The lack of quality on show after a big spending summer is astonishing… #PUSB

@ItsLewii: He’s clearly offside 🙄. Fucking lino. No pen 1st half, keeper mistake then an offside decision against us. When it rains it pours.

@CoryMatthews18: Haji should’ve scored, 2 blatant penalties not given and their second goal was offside. I think we can feel a bit hard done to today, could be having a very different conversation. #PUSB

Related Topics
Click to comment

You must be logged in to post a comment Login

Leave a Reply

More in Championship