West Brom: Mikey Johnston reveal proves Carlos Corberan is better manager than Celtic boss Brendan Rodgers
West Brom winger Mikey Johnston has enjoyed the perfect start to life at The Hawthorns following his January loan switch from Brendan Rodgers’ Celtic.
The Irish winger barely featured for the Hoops in the first half of the season, making only three starts in the Scottish Premiership, but he has hit the ground running for the Baggies scoring three times in his first seven games.
While Johnston’s transfer seemed to come out of nowhere in the final days of the transfer window, he admitted he was convinced following his first phone call with Corberan as he searched for more regular minutes.
Speaking to Sky Sports Football (5 March) he said: “I think when this was one of my options, I felt as though it was a good one anyway, but just speaking to the manager and hearing how much I could learn.
“He’s like a teacher honestly, the stuff that I’ve been taught already is valuable for my career and I feel like tactically I’m learning every day. When he phoned me up, I knew he was going to be the right coach for me.
“It was just a gametime thing [at Celtic]. In the end, we had eight wingers which was always going to be tough to get the minutes that I wanted to get. I wanted to build on last year and obviously, I’m getting older now and I want to progress my career.
“This felt like a nice step for me and everything was agreed between the two clubs so it was quite seamless.”
Will Mikey Johnston leave West Brom permanently this summer amid Celtic speculation?
It is telling that the 24-year-old suggested he has already learned so much from the Baggies boss after just over a month of playing under his management and that reveal says quite a lot about Rodgers’ work in his second spell at Parkhead.
While Johnston never explicitly said that Corberan was a better coach than the Northern Irishman, it is clear that he feels he has developed immensely under his management, something that couldn’t be said about his time in Glasgow.
Corberan and West Brom have offered the winger regular game time and he has grasped that opportunity with both hands with excellent performances and some magnificent goals that have stunned both pundits and fans alike.
Robert Snodgrass has suggested that Johnston’s start at The Hawthorns shows just why his time at Celtic may be up permanently in the summer and the Baggies will surely do everything they can to secure his signature permanently.
But if Johnston continues to go from strength to strength in a West Brom shirt, it really calls Rodgers’ credentials into question as he didn’t believe that the 24-year-old was good enough to play a regular role for Celtic and allowed him to leave.
The Hoops boss has come under increasing pressure in recent weeks as his side continues to drop points as they attempt to catch Rangers in the Premiership title race, while the Baggies look set to book their place in the playoff places this season.
It certainly feels as though Albion have the better coach in their dugout than Celtic do in Glasgow.
In other West Brom news, a supercomputer has made a new promotion prediction involving Corberan’s side at The Hawthorns
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