Spotted: What West Brom fans did to Shilen Patel at The Hawthorns before Southampton loss
West Brom fans gave new majority stakeholder Shilen Patel a standing ovation at The Hawthorns before their 2-0 defeat to Southampton on Friday night.
The American has agreed a deal worth around £60m to buy all of Guochuan Lai’s 87.8% stake in the Baggies, with a deal already ratified by the FA and announced by the club.
And Patel was present at the game on Friday night for the first time since the takeover was completed, with footage from journalist Lewis Cox (16 February) showing home fans giving him applause in a warm welcome to the club.
West Brom: A new era begins
The result on Friday night was obviously not the one that the club, team or fans wanted, but the occasion was greater than just the game.
For the first time in years there is a clear light at the end of the tunnel and West Brom have come out of the other side, and fans are allowed to now dream of what the future could bring.
Promotion to the Premier League would be perfect, but it won’t be easy considering the form of the likes of Leeds United, Leicester City and Southampton ahead of them.
Unfortunately, it didn’t go to plan, but with Carlos Corberan there is always a belief that he can get things right if given the opportunity and with a potential playoff game against Southampton in the future, there’s no reason to feel the result would be the same.
Fans are behind Patel, who has seemingly already shown his intent by wiping the club’s debt, and now the club can dream once again.
In other West Brom news, “Extraordinary” ace to miss rest of February with injury.
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