Boss calls for resilience from players and explains half-time double change
STEVE Clarke admitted today’s harsh 2-0 Hawthorns defeat by Norwich brought to an end a ‘painful’ week for Albion.
It was a third reverse inside seven days following one-goal losses against Newcastle and Manchester City.
And it was hard to take as the Baggies missed a host of chances, allowing Gary Hooper’s 13th-minute opener and Leroy Fer’s 88th-minute counter-attack strike to steal all the points for the Canaries.
“We created a lot of chances but we didn’t get the goal,” said Clarke, as his team dropped to 15th spot and just two points above the bottom three.
“We made it a difficult afternoon conceding the first goal, which actually came from a throw-in at their end – and we gave away a soft first goal.
“That gave Norwich something to hang onto and put us on the back foot.
“We created enough chances but we couldn’t get the goal that would turn the game in our favour.
“It’s been a difficult week for us.
“Three defeats in a week is sore, painful and hard to take.
“Next week we have to go to Cardiff, we have to be resilient and we have to start getting points on the board.
“But there is no easy solution.”
The Albion chief also explained why he made an attacking double change at half-time as he brought on Shane Long and Saido Berahino for Liam Ridgewell and Morgan Amalfitano.
“I thought we had a good control of the first-half as well,” he added.
“We created some chances in the first half; obviously not as many as the second half.
“It’s always easy to look back in hindsight and say we should have done this or that.
“The team that started was good enough to get something from the game.
“At half-time we had to risk something to get back into the game and that’s what we did.”