Danny Wright

Fri 10 July 2020 18:00, UK

West Brom manager Slaven Bilic has cast doubt on whether Grady Diangana will be fit enough to start against Blackburn on Saturday.

Diangana, 22, was substituted off in the second half of Albion’s 2-0 win over Derby on Wednesday and even though he revealed after the game he is not injured, Bilic is not fully sure on the loan star’s fitness ahead of the trip to Ewood Park.

“We’re still waiting but he doesn’t feel any worse. We’ll get him on the pitch tomorrow, he’s doing recovery today. It looks good but we’ll see how he develops,” said Bilic, as quoted by Express & Star journalist Joseph Masi.

Although the trip to Blackburn is a tough game for West Brom, they face Fulham on Tuesday in what promises to be the biggest game left of the Baggies’ season and Bilic is unlikely to take any risks in his team selection at Ewood Park this weekend.

That is why we are predicting that Bilic will make three changes to his line-up and revert to the popular 4-3-3 system.

Sam Johnstone is predicted to start in goals behind an unchanged back-four of Dara O’Shea, Semi Ajayi, Kyle Bartley and Conor Townsend.

Ahmed Hegazi is back from suspension but we don’t think he will return straight away and Kieran Gibbs might not be fit enough yet to replace Townsend at left-back.

Jake Livermore and Romaine Sawyers are expected to keep their spots in the midfield but Filip Krovinovic could come in to replace Diangana amid doubts surrounding his fitness.

In the attack, Matheus Pereira is predicted to start but we think that Kamil Grosicki could be rested at Ewood Park with Callum Robinson starting on the left-wing ahead of him.

And the same goes up front as Charlie Austin could be rested and make way for Hal Robson-Kanu to return to the team.

In other West Brom news, Albion could be invited to play for silverware at Wembley next month.

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