West Brom boss Carlos Corberan details more injury frustration after Swansea defeat

The Baggies travelled to south Wales without skipper Jed Wallace and having loanee Jeremy Sarmiento recalled by Brighton.

The visitors had prepared with John Swift starting at the Swansea.com Stadium but Albion's chief playmaker, eventually named a substitute, again began feeling pain in his calf from half-time and was unable to feature. The trio add to already unavailable Matt Phillips and Josh Maja, with Grady Diangana off to AFCON duty this week.

Swans edged out the Baggies 1-0 through Liam Cullen's early second-half winner in a low-key, otherwise even affair.

Corberan said of Swift, who has had muscle problems since an early-October lay-off: "Yesterday we prepared the game with Swift in the first XI of the team.

"He was completing the preparation, it wasn't even training, and he was fine. After he still felt something in the calf. There is of course an injury there, that we couldn't detect before because he's not in normal conditions to compete and to play.

"With this doubt, we decided to test again this morning with the doctor and we made an ultrasound. The ultrasound was positive but the player felt uncomfortable with the pain.

"We decided to put him on the bench and to change the gameplan, then we'd see in the warm up to see how he was feeling and if he could on the bench or not.

"In the warm up of the first half he was fine. Fenton (Heard) travelled and he wasn't on the bench, but in the warm up before the second half he felt bad.

"Imagine how frustration this type of situation is, for all of us, because it's better to know that you cannot have a player and have another young player than to think Swift was there but, in the end, he wasn't there.

"If you come today, for the fourth (Christmas/New Year) game in a row, without Sarmiento, without Swift, without Wallace...everything needs to work very well for us to win the game, but I didn't see this as an excuse. I saw my team competing and making things that could have meant we took something from the game."

Missing skipper Wallace (adductor) is due for a scan on Tuesday.

Corberan felt the contest hinged on Albion taking their big moment when on time early on.

Jayson Molumby started in Swift's place as a different sort of No.10 despite an injection in his foot. The Irishman lasted 75 minutes before being replaced by loan back-up right-back Pipa - who in that moment became his side's emergency creative option.

"Molumby arrived to this game with an injury in the foot," Corberan said. "He was having an injection so that he could play. The medical advice was to start the game with the injection.

"The effect of the injection would decrease with the passing of minutes. You cannot inject just before the game, you need to do it with time. That's why we decided to play him, with limitation and not in his normal condition and to keep Chalobah to come off the bench."

Daryl Dike was deemed not ready to return from the best part of nine months out with a ruptured Achilles. The big striker is closing in on action after training but, along with Albion's medical staff, did not feel confident to feature.

"I was pushing yesterday the doctor, I was pushing him personally because I had the confidence to go with him from the bench in the last minutes," the head coach added.

"I was taking the responsibility to use him just from the minute 80, but the medical staff and the player didn't have the confidence so that's why he didn't travel."

The head coach felt Brandon Thomas-Asante's one-v-one opportunity before the break, created by impressive youngster Tom Fellows, was his side's crucial moment.

"I would say a lack of accuracy (led to defeat), for me, in the moment we had to score the goal," Corberan summarised. "Because in general the start was 50-50 but in the passing of the minutes for me we were better than Swansea in the first half.

"In the first half we created two big possibilities to score the goal, I think the biggest chance to score was the pass of Tom Fellows for Asante in front of the keeper, I think it was the biggest chance of the game and after Fellows had another opportunity too.

"We finished the first half very well and should go to the rest time with a one-goal advantage, especially that because in the passing of the minutes we knew our options on the bench were not attacking possibilities - they were defensive possibilities."