Sam Allardyce praises ‘brilliant’ Sam Johnstone and explains keeper’s frustration
Sam Johnstone was key for West Brom once again on Sunday and Sam Allardyce praised his contribution to the team.
The goalkeeper earned numerous plaudits for his display, particularly his late save to deny Harry Maguire.
Fans and former Albion goalkeeper Ben Foster were amazed by that stop, and Allardyce also heaped praise on his number one.
He told talkSPORT (8:36:55), “Brilliant, absolutely brilliant and of course he’s just as frustrated as me by all these goals going in and he’s trying his best.
“We have to help him in that situation.
“A brilliant save at the end so we’re getting better defensively but he is a fantastic goalkeeper.
“If we are going to get to where we are going to get then we will need him on certain occasions.”
Bigger picture
It is all well and good to have individuals performing well, but it will ultimately come to nothing if they do not perform as a collective.
We have learned that the hard way that season, but at least Big Sam understands that key lesson.
Johnstone, along with the likes of Conor Townsend and Matheus Pereira, has performed really well at times, yet we still have only two clean sheets to boast of.
That means his table-topping number of saves (98) is practically made irrelevant.
Johnstone made five saves on Sunday but could do nothing to stop Bruno Fernandes’ wonderful strike.
The midfielder was left in far too much space, just as Harry Kane was the week before.
Until we address the glaring defensive issues this problem will continue.
Big Sam mentions the improvement against Man United, with Okay Yokuslu really helping out on his full debut, but it is pointless unless we back it up against Burnley.
We need to be difficult to beat over a period of games if we want to pick up points and go on an unbeaten run, which is Allardyce’s aim.
If we fail to do that Johnstone will continue conceding, regardless of how well he is playing.
In other West Brom news, ‘Unreal’, ‘Great replacement’: Some WBA fans thrilled with ‘real talent’ after big loanee update.