Darren Fletcher: We must move on

Captain Darren Fletcher has warned Albion that their double derby disappointment against Villa cannot be allowed to derail their Premier League survival bid.

Fletcher says the Baggies must put their worst week of the season behind them - because top-flight safety is still not secure.

Fletcher and Co have 30 points ahead of Saturday's Hawthorns meeting with Stoke but they face a daunting run-in with Liverpool, Manchester United, Chelsea and Arsenal among their last five games.

So in his captain's column for the club's programme for Saturday's vital game, midfielder Fletcher says they cannot dwell on their back-to-back defeats at Villa Park last week as they prepare for a potentially pivotal month.

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"It is very hard to get over defeats like the Cup game at Villa but by the time we came back in on Monday, we'd shaken off the emotion and the disappointment because as a professional, that's what you have to do," said Fletcher, who played in last Tuesday's 2-1 Premier League defeat at Villa but was cup-tied for the weekend's 2-0 FA Cup quarter-final loss.

"There is still a very big job ahead of us in the Premier League so you can't afford to be too down for too long.

"There is so much still for us to play for this season, and we need to be clear about the job in front of us. We hit the 30-point mark against Southampton which was very important and now we have 10 games left in our season.

"We have to keep on putting points on the board week by week, and the sooner we can get ourselves up to 40 points, the better.

"We don't want to be waiting until the end, we don't want to be taking things down to the wire, we want to get our points as quickly as we can, get as many as we can and finish as high up the league as we possibly can."

Albion boss Tony Pulis will check on the fitness of striker Victor Anichebe for the meeting with but he will face his former club without suspended midfielder Claudio Yacob.