Chris Lepkowski and Adrian Goldberg slam West Brom over Branislav Ivanovic signing
Chris Lepkowski and Adrian Goldberg have taken aim at Slaven Bilic and the West Brom board over the signing of Branislav Ivanovic at the start of the season.
The experienced Serb, now 37, was brought in by former Albion boss Bilic in September on a free transfer.
But it’s been a disastrous spell at The Hawthorns for the three-time Premier League winner who has made just two fleeting substitute appearances since the disastrous FA Cup exit to League One side Blackpool on January 9.
Speaking on The Liquidator podcast [10/05/21] former Birmingham Mail journalist Lepkowski and radio presenter Goldberg fumed at the transfer.
“Ivanovic was an incredibly reckless signing,” Lepkowski said.
Goldberg responded, “All the odds were against it. No player has returned to the Premier League at the age of 36 after four years away and been a success.
“That was betting your last 100 quid on the 1000/1 outsider on the Grand National.
“As a fan you say ‘presumably Bilic knows and trusts the guy’, but it was a catastrophic error because not only was Bilic not good enough by a long, long way, that wasted a lot of potential money in wages that could have been spent on another player, or another two players who could have done a good job for us.”
Gamble gone horribly wrong
Eyebrows were firmly raised when Ivanovic pitched up in the West Midlands at the start of the 2020/21 campaign.
He had been out of the English game since early 2017 after leaving Chelsea for Russian giants Zenit Saints Petersburg as he seemingly wound down the latter years of his playing days.
Ivanovic was a magnificent defender for the Blues in his heyday but he looked tired and cumbersome at the end, paving the way for his Premier League departure.
So there’s no wonder that his arrival at Albion at the age of 36 was greeted with an air of suspicion.
But with Bilic keen on bringing him in we withdrew our dissenting voices and threw our support for the duo.
Unfortunately, it’s a move that has worked out horribly for all parties.
Our relegation back to the Championship was sealed with a 3-1 defeat at Arsenal on Sunday and Ivanovic was nowhere to be seen, absent from the matchday squad since picking up an injury against Chelsea in April after only coming on 13 minutes prior.
Another man missing was Bilic, who was sacked as Albion manager in December to make way for Sam Allardyce.
We’ve had some shockers over the years, but signing Ivanovic has to be up there with the worst of them.
In other West Brom news, Albion want to sign ‘Genius’ Brazilian-born midfielder in summer rebuild.
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