Danny Wright

Sat 11 July 2020 18:35, UK

Former West Brom defender Daryl Burgess could not understand why Slaven Bilic substituted Jake Livermore off in the 1-1 draw with Blackburn on Saturday.

Livermore, 30, was replaced by inconsistent youngster Rekeem Harper in the 69th minute with the scores level and after that moment, Blackburn seemed to have more big chances to score than the Baggies did.

Burgess took to his personal Twitter account after the change was made to air his concern with Bilic’s decision.

“I don’t get Slav changing Livermore for Harper,” said the ex-Baggies star, following by a thinking emoji.

Harper has divided opinion among West Brom fans for some time now but there was no denying that once he came onto the pitch on Saturday, Rovers seemed way more likely to score than they did before.

Stats by WhoScored show that in over 20 minutes of action, Harper managed to attempt just nine passes and has just 14 touches of the ball.

His impact was next to nothing but the worst thing about Bilic’s decision was that, during a time of need, he took off the captain and the most experienced, defensive-minded midfielder to replace him with a young player who hasn’t been cutting the mustard.

Livermore’s had an injury knock recently so maybe he could not see out the entire 90 minutes but if that is the case, why not throw Chris Brunt on?

Brunt is someone who wants to put himself in the shop window with his contract expiring this month but also he is a leader, a club legend and someone who will do whatever it takes for West Bromwich Albion.

Bilic’s tactics did not match up to Tony Mowbray’s in that second half and we need to see an improvement against Fulham on Tuesday.

Otherwise, we could drop out of the top-two when Brentford play Preston 24 hours later.

In other West Brom news, fans hailed this Albion player as being “better than Messi” against Blackburn.

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