Albion keeper Dean Kiely today paid tribute to boss Tony Mowbray and the bravery under fire that he believes led the Baggies to the Premier League.
The veteran shot-stopper saluted Mowbray for sticking to his guns all season and refusing to compromise his football principles. “The gaffer does things very pragmatically, he’s very thoughtful and that’s how he likes his teams to be,” said Kiely.
“I think we have been that and rightly so – we’ve done it in the way he’s wanted it to be. I’ve played in many teams where managers want you to play that way but when there’s a first sniff of something going wrong they can abort it and start lumping the ball 90 yards.
“This manager stuck to his beliefs, stayed strong and we carried that out to the letter of his law. That gives us job satisfaction.
“He deserves all the credit. I had the choice of six or seven clubs when I came here and I had to make a choice about which club fitted and which manager was right in terms of how he wanted to do things and take the club forward.
“I wanted to buy into that and I believed in everything the manager said.
“Credit to him because after the disappointment of the Wembley play-off final last year it would have been easy for the whole club to suffer. But we used that disappointment and stinging blow in the correct manner - that’s the response we got.”
And Kiely hailed the Baggies’ handling of a bizarre Championship season in which a host of clubs have struggled to handle the pressure of leading the race for the Premier League.
The Championship lead has changed hands more than a dozen times during the course of the campaign and Kiely said it was vital the Baggies stayed calm.
“When you see all that going on you get frustrated that you’re not 10 points clear, which we’ve felt we should be at times this season,” he said.
“But then you look around and say that Stoke could make a case for that, Watford could, Charlton could. Once we stopped being frustrated and re-evaluated where we needed to be that helped us get where we want to get to.”
6 Comments
Just about sums it up. Well said and well done. I predict a win at QPR on Sun. Cant wait.
The manner of our promotion is what makes this team such a joy to watch, and a great prospect for next season.
Even if Stoke go up as champions - even if Hull had gone up champions - even if we had to go through the playoffs, the style of our football would make us favorites to stay up out of the three promoted sides.
Brave is exactly right. He stuck to his guns even though so many said you can’t play your way out of the Championship. He also set out to win every match and attack at every opportunity. At no time did he look to play safe and take a point. Also if Neil Clement had been fit all year I think we would have had that 10/15 point gap at the top.
I agree with Throstlehead - Neil Clement has been excellent since his return - a centre-back who gives you confidence when he brings the ball out or makes long passes to set up the attack. Great left foot at set-pieces as well. I think we would have let in fewer daft goals -although I’m not sure that TM fancied him at first?
no2…happy baggie your having a laugh aint ya you dreaming again the proverbial yo yo
Absolutely right No.3 and I think Clem hadn’t been truly fit for a long time so TM never saw what we knew he could do. Some of those arrowed 70 yard passes on Monday would have had the gaffer purring I think. To see a pass so long, no height to it, land at Gera’s feet on the opposite wing, then controlled with one touch, had me in Wonderland. Let’s hope he stays fit and well for next year. We shall need him. Young Barnett is coming along in leaps and bounds since Clem played alongside him. No fancy stuff from him, just solid defending.