On Friday night in the Sky Bet Championship, Albion managed to draw 1-1 with Leeds United.
Luke Ayling’s header prevented Brandon Thomas-Asante from scoring in the second half, ensuring that both teams earned a draw.
The Baggies visit Middlesbrough at The Hawthorns on the following Saturday to begin their next game.
Conor Townsend was replaced by Thomas-Asante, and Matt Phillips was moved to the left, as Carlos Corberán maintained the 3-4-3 shape.
For the majority of the opening frame, Albion was up against it. Leeds came the closest when Joe Gelhardt’s deflected shot hit the post after 26 minutes.
Darnell Furlong diverted Phillips’ threatening low cross wide at the back post as halftime drew near, but despite a largely resolute performance, it stayed scoreless at the break.
Following the break, the Baggies came out with renewed vigor and immediately hit the post as Illan Meslier expertly stopped Jed Wallace’s poke from going in.
However, they quickly made a breakthrough as Thomas-Asante’s mistakenly deflected shot from Jayson Molumby inside the area gave them the lead. The 2,000 traveling supporters went berserk.
But Corberán’s team was only able to hold off Leeds until the 72nd minute, when Ayling scored from Dan James’ cross to tie the score at 1-1.
And that’s how it ended up at Elland Road, with Albion returning to the Black Country with a draw and four points from their first three league games.
Palmer, Ajayi, Kipre, Pieters (Townsend 75), Molumby, Phillips, Yokuslu (Chalobah 86), Wallace (Gardner-Hickman 86), Thomas-Asante (Maja 75), and Swift (Sarmiento 69) are the members of Albion.
Griffiths, Bartley, Mowatt, and Fellows are the replacements.
Carlos Corberán applauded
Carlos Corberán applauded his players’ desire to “fight until the end” during Friday’s night’s 1-1 draw with Leeds United.
The Baggies came away from Elland Road with a credible point, taking the lead through Brandon Thomas-Asante’s fortuitous goal before conceding a 72nd-minute equaliser when Luke Ayling headed home.
Albion had plenty of defending to do in the last 25 to 30 minutes in Yorkshire, and the boss says he values the effort his side put in to earn a share of the spoils.
Carlos said: “I think that we could’ve created more chances than we managed to.
“I think we showed a lot of personality tonight.
“In the first half, the chances Leeds had were because of our own mistakes in the middle of the pitch when we didn’t manage the ball well enough. Instead of giving problems to the opponent, we were giving ourselves problems.
“I think our performance at the beginning of the second half was excellent. We found a way to attack them and to hurt them.
“Maybe the fact that we scored our goal quite soon into the second half, it made us defend more than we perhaps wanted to defend or expected to defend.
“Today, we tried to support the squad by maintaining the five-man back line, but we subsequently realized the best approach was to go to a four and be aggressive, which we hoped would give us the incentive in the game.”I think it was a game we could’ve managed better to achieve a better result, but I have to appreciate the effort of the players,” you said. “I think the point was fair in terms of what both teams created.”They put in a tremendous amount of effort and were very well prepared for the game.
“Our guys fought until the very end, even though Leeds had a ton of possession, and this is something I admire very much.
“We know we can perform better, and we’re determined to work on aspects of the game which will make us even more competitive.”
