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Steve Bruce: We need to convert performances into results

Steve Bruce

Albion boss Steve Bruce says his side need to turn their performances into results as they prepare for a home double header in the Sky Bet Championship.

The Baggies host Cardiff City and Hull City this week at The Hawthorns hoping to build on positive early-season showings and claim their first league victory of the new campaign.

Bruce's side have earned draws against Middlesbrough and Watford so far, as well as a Carabao Cup win over Sheffield United, but were defeated at Ewood Park by Blackburn on Sunday.

And the boss admits that results need to start coming alongside performances to drive his team up the table.

He said: "All along you know that you need results."

"We’re playing really well, we’ve had a really good week in terms of the way we’ve played, we’ve now got to convert that into winning a few games and then we can have an idea as to where we’re going to be.

"We haven’t had a couple of results, and we all know it’s about results. But I think the way the supporters were when we played against Watford, and the away fans that went to Blackburn can also see, what we’re trying to achieve - and I think that’s vitally important.

“It’s important that they see the team playing in a certain way, too. I’ve been here for the best part of five or six months and they’re hopefully starting to see what we’re trying to do."

Bruce said, having reviewed footage of the fixture with Blackburn, Albion simply need to start taking their chances, with their profligacy in front of goal becoming an 'Achilles heel'.

"Sometimes it’s difficult," he added. "I’ve watched it back a couple of times and I think all of us have thought ‘how have we come away losing that?’.

"In football that happens. I said that after Watford as well. For me, the performance was very, very good.

"Again, our Achilles heel has been not being able to take and convert the chances we create. It’s a problem to us, and we have to improve on that.

"But the overall performance of the team, the way we were was very, very good."

The results have not subdued the support of the fans across the opening fixtures of the campaign, and the gaffer is hopeful it will continue as the team push for their first win of the league season with an almost fully fit squad available to choose from.

He said: "Football clubs are always about their supporters. You can generally understand the mood through them. I remember when I came in last February and thought it wasn’t like I’d heard it before. It was quiet.

"The fans were disappointed because they’d had a difficult 18 months or so, getting relegated, not getting the performances they wanted.

"But against Watford I could sense that they were right behind the team, the support was magnificent and it was like The Hawthorns of old. So we’ll hope for the same again, we’ll try and do the same again – I think it goes hand in hand.

"Everyone’s OK at the moment. Obviously the news on Daryl wasn’t very good last week, which has blighted us in that respect.

"Hopefully we can get a result which obviously everybody needs."

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