Wright View: Doomsday clock doesn’t care for stunning West Brom form as takeover deadline approaches
Danny Wright is a lifelong West Brom fan thanks to his dad, who grew up idolising Cyrille Regis and John Wile. Danny’s had to endure the likes of Victor Anichebe and Diego Lugano. He’s now putting his passion for the Albion into words with a regular fan view for West Brom News…
West Brom really are flying.
Carlos Corberan’s been here for just over a year now and it’s unbelievable that this is the same club – with a fairly similar playing squad – to the relegation-threatened one he replaced Steve Bruce at.
Saturday night’s 2-0 win over Ipswich Town at The Hawthorns was arguably the Baggies’ best performance of the season.
While the Tractor Boys are a newly-promoted team in the Championship, they’re well-cemented in the automatic promotion spots and were unbeaten on their travels before heading to the Black Country on 25 November.
Albion’s win sees them up to fifth in the Championship and talk of promotion is understandably buzzing around fans on social media, callers on BBC WM and punters at The Hawthorns.
But the doomsday clock is ticking down to zero with West Brom in desperate need of new owners before the end of 2023.
We’re less than a month away from Christmas now and based on the little chatter there’s been about a takeover, it feels unlikely to me that a deal will be done with the Chinese that’s ratified by the EFL before the fireworks start on midnight, 1 January 2024.
Daily Mail journalist Tom Collomosse reported on 15 November that a deal is closer now than ever for Guochuan Lai and co to leave The Hawthorns for good.
It was reported that the deal will be worth £60million, including the paying off of a £20million-plus loan from MSD Holdings.
While it’s encouraging to hear that, the fact that the deal is close doesn’t mean that the takeover is close.
Lai and the other shareholders behind the Chinese ownership need to agree a deal and then that deal needs to be checked by all the necessary authorities.
Is that going to take more than a month? Well, it could take several.
I don’t know for certain where exactly the £60million takeover is at. There’s too much vagueness surrounding the reports that have been published.
But what I do know is that West Brom need new owners in place before 1 January because it probably won’t take long before asset-stripping starts in order to keep the club running.
On 19 September, the ever-reliable John Percy reported on The Telegraph website that West Brom’s financial issues are increasing because they didn’t sell enough players in the summer transfer window.
Bids and pursuits of Brandon Thomas-Asante, Jed Wallace and John Swift were kicked into touch by the Albion but, according to Percy, this has caused “major concerns over future cash-flow with the club already under pressure to sell players when the transfer window reopens in January”.
If West Brom don’t have new owners from day one of the January transfer window, the club’s fantastic season is under huge threat.
I don’t want to be dragging everyone down after such an incredible win against Ipswich but a dose of reality is needed.
This squad could be annihilated in January and if a Premier League club pulls the trigger on a manager in the coming weeks, who’s to say that Corberan won’t leave simply so the Baggies can make a quick buck on a compensation fee?
West Brom’s form right now isn’t promotion form based on how the January window could pan out. It’s form that should keep us in the division if the worst-case scenario does unfold.
But the protests have pretty much stopped and the anger towards Lai and his cronies has seemingly fizzled out based on the team’s performances on the pitch.
I wish that what happens on matchday solely dictates how I feel about being a West Brom supporter right now but it doesn’t. There’s always that dark cloud lingering.
In other West Brom news, here are our player ratings for the win over Ipswich, with one player scoring 9/10.