Alan Pardew promises to 'free up' West Brom's talented squad

The new Baggies boss gave a polished performance at his unveiling this afternoon, and spoke with passion about the quality of the squad.

He lined up against Bryan Robson and Cyrille Regis during his playing days, and said that golden era came to mind when he thought about West Bromwich Albion.

And even though he admitted the immediate concern was ending Albion's 13-game winless streak, he said he wanted the team to play a more flamboyant style of football.

Pardew is aware of the supporters' disgruntlement with the approach under Tony Pulis, and believes he will be able to offer a change.

"The most important fact is to win games," he said. "That's the bottom line. Tony does that very well, but he does it in a different manner to me.

"My best teams, and I can only talk about myself, play on the front foot and try and put teams under pressure and they sometimes get a bloody nose in doing that.

"And that's what I'll deliver here at West Brom. Hopefully somewhere along that line we can get up to 1.5 or 1.7 pts a game.

"I've achieved that in the past at certain times with clubs and that's what I'll try and do here."

Pardew is confident he'll be able to turn results and performances around, because he did something similar at Crystal Palace.

He felt he was harshly done by at Palace, who sacked him three days before Christmas last year after six wins in 2016.

“I think when I went back into Crystal Palace it was something similar," he said. "They were playing quite a rigid game and I freed it up a little bit.

"I hope to free up this team a little bit more if I can. That's easier said than done because we need to start winning games to do that but that's what I hope to do.

"We managed to do that at Crystal Palace with some fantastic results and performances against some of the top teams, too. So that's what we hope to do here.”

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Pardew, who had a length non-league career in his playing days, came up against Regis when he was at Hayes before the Baggies bought him.

He also played against Robson in an FA Cup final and subsequent replay for Crystal Palace against Manchester United. And it is those glory days from the 1970s that he is using as inspiration for his team.

“I knew that question was going to come about this football club and I'm not armed with anything, but it did make me think about Bryan Robson, a player who kind of represents what I like to put on a football pitch," he said. "I had to mark him in the Cup final twice, which wasn't something that I enjoyed, I've got to be honest.

"He was a fantastic player and I think it was about 1978 he was in a Baggies shirt, doing his stuff.

"That's the sort of era that I remember most about West Brom as an outsider, because I'm obviously from London and it's not my team.

"But that's the sort of thing that I remember – Laurie Cunningham etc, that era, and Cyrille Regis, who I actually played against at Hayes, he smashed up a couple of centre-halves even then, in the non-league days.”

Pardew, who has signed a two-and-a-half-year deal, is taking training for the first time on Thursday ahead of his opening game against former club Palace on Saturday.

But he did warn Albion fans not to expect a titanic shift in style this weekend, or even next weekend.

"In the short term, to get where I want to be for the Palace game will be difficult, and maybe even the Swansea game," he said.

"Not long after that I'd like to think they'll have a good idea of what I want and expect.

"There's enough experience in that dressing room, people who have played at higher clubs than I've managed, to change our style a little bit and have success."