Bilic opens up on West Brom ‘privilege’ that has excited him before Charlton clash
There is no hiding that West Brom didn’t enjoy the best of Christmas periods in the Championship.
Winning one of their last five league games, the Baggies have dropped to second despite consistently having a small gap to Leeds United in the top two.
The 1-1 draw against their promotion rivals saw the Baggies return to their best at points, but it is something else that has excited Slaven Bilic this week.
The Baggies boss has recently opened up on the chance that he has had to push his players further in training for a full week, and that has clearly excited him.
“Definitely, you normally base your selection on the games, of course, but also on training,” Bilic told the Birmingham Mail.
“In that period you didn’t have normal training or a normal process between the games where you can hold debates, or refresh.
“You can’t test them, you don’t have that privilege. This was the week that you could test them, especially for the players who didn’t play against Charlton.”
The Croatian loves to speak his mind, and he will have been pushing his players hard to kick on and start a similar unbeaten run to the one ended by Middlesbrough a fortnight ago.
This extra week hasn’t only given Bilic the chance to push his squad further, but has allowed some of his injured players to step up their comeback – Grady Diangana is back in contention for Saturday’s game.
Charlton will be out to avenge their FA Cup defeat last week at the Valley, but they could be up against a completely different animal this time around.
In other West Brom news, Steve Madeley shares update on West Brom link to Emre Mor