Sponsorship deal is delayed

Albion have delayed a decision on their new shirt sponsor for another fortnight to allow late bidders to enter the race.

The Baggies have a shortlist of three potential new sponsors – thought to include betting giants Ladbrokes – but they are ready to wait until the last possible moment in the hope of landing a better deal.

The club are targeting a deal worth at least £750,000-per-year to replace T-Mobile, who ended their sponsorship this summer after four years.

But they must make a decision in the next two weeks in order to get replica shirts to shops for the mid-July launch.

Chairman Jeremy Peace said: “We’ve got a few names and offers.

“T-Mobile was a great partnership for four years. It was a really good international name and they had a great profile from it. They had good value out of us so it’s a hard act to follow.

“But I would like to think that we can attract somebody of a similar ilk – maybe not another mobile company but somebody similar.

“I would prefer somebody international.

“We need to have got the sponsor in place for the shirts to go on sale for holiday-makers.

“We are looking to launch the home shirts in mid-July and the away shirts in August.

“We are in the final stages but we are still looking to see what is out there.”

Resolving the shirt sponsorship issue is just one of Peace’s tasks before the new Premier League begins.

But he is looking forward to the new campaign with excitement and today paid a fresh tribute to manager Tony Mowbray as he prepares to lead the club back into the top flight.

“We all love working with him,” said Peace. “He is a great bloke and we can’t sing his praises highly enough.

“One of the reasons we had success last season was because he was instrumental in pulling the whole lot together.

“He kept us all together and put us all on track from the administrative side to the dressing room.

“I just hope we will be able to stay with that.”

* Finance director Mark Jenkins says the regeneration of the Halfords Lane Stand is on course to be completed for the start of the new season.

He said: “I was there on Tuesday and it’s like a building site at the moment but everything is on schedule to be completed.

“You can already see the size of the concourses is better.”