Posts Tagged ‘fa cup’

Esprit UK Sponsor Albion Shirts Again

Albion have clinched a 2nd deal with Esprit UK to have their logo on the Albion shirts for a 2nd time during the Albion Blackpool game tommorrow.

The Local firm who are owned by life long Baggies fans appeared on Albion shirts for the televised victory over Newcastle in the FA Cup.

Esprit UK, the 4th of the single shirt sponsors are the first to take a non televised game and also the first to take the option twice, others that have sponsored the shirts are Blue Square, Victor Chandler and Sbobet.

News from the Hawthorns is that they have now a shirt sponsor for every home game of the season remaining, so there is very limited opportunity to get sponsorship in this way now, short of away games and dare we say it – play off games should the club not win automatic promotion.

West Brom Reading FA Cup Replay Preview

The Baggies went out on penalty’s against Middlesbrough at this stage of the FA Cup just 3 seasons ago and Roberto Di Matteo is making sure as best as he can that this does not happen again tonight.

“We have practised penalties even though it’s not the same on the training ground as when you go into a game and you have to do it in front of 20,000 and the pressure is on,” said the Albion boss.

“By now I know the character of my players and I have a good idea of which ones I would like to take penalties, if it goes that far.”

Players that may return tonight include James Morrisson and Marek Cech, both fit again although Morrisson clearly lacking in match practice after 10 months out.

Giles Barnes will still play no part as he is not quite fit yet, Ishmael Miller still has an injured ankle, Jerome Thomas has another game where he is banned, then the 2 loan players Frank Nouble and Ben Watson are cup tied.

Di Matteo has said “We have to take into consideration that Cech has been out for three weeks and Morrison for ten months.

“But it’s good to have some players back.

“Morrison’s been doing well but competitive games are completely different.

“The fact he has been out of the game for a long time means we have to be careful with him.

“Barnes is getting closer but he’s not in the frame for tomorrow.

“It’s hard for me to say when Giles and Ishmael Miller will be back.”

At the Madejski Stadium 2 weeks back the Albion came from behind twice and the late equaliser was very cruel on Reading, however, with a home tie in the quarter finals up for grabs at against Aston Villa or Crystal Palace the Baggies are surely going to be well up for this game.

Roman Bednar should keep his shirt and Abdoulaye Meite who was an unused substitute on Sunday in the defeat at Bristol City may get a recall.

Another player likely to keep his place tonight will be the in form Albion defender Jonas Olsson , he is over the moon at getting his first ever call up to the Sweden national team.

His top notch Baggies performances have seen him with just rewards, a place against Wales in Swansea next Wednesday.

Olsson won 25 caps at under-21 level but an appearance at the Liberty Stadium would be his first full cap.

The former NEC Nijmegen centre-back said: “Since I moved to England I have developed in the right direction.

“I feel that I have come to a country whose football suits me, and I have grown with the task.

“It is very nice to have a chance in the ‘big’ team. I’ve played some under-21 games before and to pull on the national team jersey is special and it makes me happy.”

Quarter finals to be televised.

Whoever wins the replay between Albion and Reading this time next week will play either Villa or Palace on Sunday, March 7 (ko 1.45pm).

Will it be a live televised game on Sunday March 7th from the Hawthorns or the Madjeski?

All FA Cup quarter final games will be screened live on ITV1.

Here are the times and dates for each game.

Saturday, March 6

Portsmouth v Blues (ko 12.30pm)

Fulham v Bolton or Tottenham (ko 5.20pm)

Sunday, March 7

Reading or West Brom v Crystal Palace or Villa (ko 1.45pm)

Chelsea v Manchester City or Stoke (ko 4pm)

Jerome Thomas gets a further ban

Jerome Thomas faced an FA disciplinary hearing this morning and was handed a further 1 match to his already long 4 match ban.

Albion legal director Darren Eales was at Wembley with Thomas who had to face a fresh charge of violent conduct for his actions after the red card at Plymouth.

Having already served 2 games of the now 5 game ban he will be available a week Saturday, quite soon really, however testament to the amount of games needed to be played in such a short time. This will allow him to play in the Derby game in just 11 days.

The games he will miss are Cardiff tonight, Bristol City and next week’s FA Cup fifth-round replay against Reading.

FA Cup draw may match Albion and Villa

This afternoon’s FA Cup draw see’s the possibility of the Baggies facing local rivals Aston Villa at the Hawthorns.

Still two games need to be settled, however, should Villa and Albion both progress to the quarter finals they will be paired against each other.

After an entertaining draw today, Villa need to replay against Crystal Palace and then the result of that will see them play the winners out of next Wednesday’s Albion, Reading replay.

Chelsea face Manchester City or Stoke in the quarter-finals. The reigning champions easily beat Cardiff City 4-1 yesterday to make the next round and they will host either City or the Potters, who played out a 1-1 draw at Eastlands last night.

Elsewhere, Portsmouth will face Birmingham while Fulham meet Bolton or Tottenham.

FA Cup quarter-final draw:

Chelsea v Manchester City or Stoke

Fulham v Bolton or Tottenham

Reading or West Brom v Crystal Palace or Aston Villa

Portsmouth v Birmingham

Ties to be played on the weekend of March 6 and 7.

Di Matteo’s selection headaches growing and growing

Roberto Di Matteo’s selection headaches have mounted tonight after Albion’s 4th game in under two weeks and 5th game in a fortnight. There are now another 3 games to come in the next 10 days too, including the FA Cup replay scheduled for Wednesday 24th.

Andy Slory should have started today, however, limped out of the pre match warm up with an Achilles injury so the Dutchman may be out for a while.

Gonzalo Jara, needed five stitches to a foot injury after todays game at Reading and Abdoulaye Meite was also forced of the Madejski Stadium pitch with an ankle injury.

Di Matteo is now going to have major concerns for the trip to Cardiff Tuesday night, what with these 3 injuries today and the existing injury list consisting of Marek Cech (hamstring), Ishmael Miller (ankle) and James Morrison (heel). Then of course we have Jerome Thomas with 3 matches left on his ban and a longer ban possible when he faces an FA charge. Now there is also Mulumbu banned for 2 games too, after this afternoons sending of for a second bookable offence.

“The number of games we’re playing is very demanding and I’m a bit sad because we’ve lost Jara to injury, Meite had to be taken off and Mulumbu is now suspended,” said Di Matteo.

“I already had a big injury list back home, so that’s a bit of a downside.

“I’ll have to assess the situation and then we’ll see what we have to do.

“Before today’s game, I already had five players out.

“Jara needed five stitches and we’ll have to wait and see on Meite’s injury – but hopefully it’s not too bad.”

Starting line up at Reading – Slory starts.

Simon Cox today returns to his home town club Reading where his career started, he joined the Royals aged nine and worked up through the ranks before making his League Cup debut at Luton in September 2005. He will be so happy that he has been handing a starting position.

Hopes are high with Baggies fans today, especially as the Albion have been quite successful in the FA Cup in recent years, reaching a Wembley semi final most recently.

Pointers for more success include the fact that Reading have not got passed this stage of the cup for 83 years.

Albion have the best away record in the country and are the championships highest scoring team.

The players want the cup run and are hungry for a trophy.

Reading on the other hand have beaten premiership opposition twice, both Liverpool and Burnley have fallen to reading.

Reading have won 4 of their last five games and beat Albion in the last FA Cup meeting between the 2 teams.

Andy Slory gets his full Albion debut, Roberto Di Matteo makes four changes to the victoriuos Scunthorpe team.

The Dutch winger gets the cup-tied Frank Nouble ‘s position.

Gianni Zuiverloon and Abdoulaye Meite come in, with Gonzalo Jara pushed into central midfield and Gabriel Tamas rested.

Youssouf Mulumbu and Robert Koren also meet the bench as Simon Cox comes in to the team.

Youth Sam Mantom, just 18 next Saturday, is handed an early birthday present as he is named among the subs.

Reading (4-5-1): Federici, Griffin, Ingimarsson, Mills, Bertrand, McAnuff, Howard, Karacan, Gunnarson, Kebe, Long. Subs: Hamer, Tabb, Henry, Church, Robson-Kanu, Rasiak, Pearce.

Albion (4-5-1): Carson, Zuiverloon, Meite, Olsson, Mattock, Brunt, Cox, Jara, Dorrans, Slory, Bednar. Subs: Kiely, Koren, Moore, Wood, Tamas, Mulumbu, Mantom.

Ref: C Foy (Merseyside).

Reading Albion preview, team news and odds detail

Reading and West Brom meet tomorrow in an all Championship FA Cup fifth round tie and Albion are not expecting anything like the easy 3 to 1 victory they had at the Hawthorns in October.

In a game where one club is struggling near the foot of the table and another club is topping the table, you would not expect the struggling club to be so expected to win. The Royals, however, have beaten top opposition including the premier giants Liverpool and also Burnley, to get thus far.

Saturday’s game at the Madejski Stadium looks likely to render the pair’s differing league fortunes irrelevant, with Reading as sure that they will get through to the quarter final as any of the other 15 teams still in the hat.

The Baggies head for the Madejski Stadium looking to book a place in the quarterers but have to get past a rejuvenated Reading team, who have only lost three times in 11 games since new head coach Brian McDermott took over and have moved within a point of Coca-Cola Championship safety.

Royals tactician is looking to mastermind another scalp en route to a place in the last eight, with Albion the team in his sight’s..

Reading will be without defender Zurab Khizanishvili, the Georgia international made his home debut in the win over Plymouth on Tuesday night but is now cup tied having played for Blackburn in the FA Cup already.

Matt Mills is available again, however, after serving a one-match ban and he should take Khizanishvili’s place in the centre of defence.

Sigurdsson, who has scored in both rounds has been out with a foot injury while Czech Republic international Matejovsky has been struggling with an abdominal injury, however, both are rumoured to be close to fitness and may play a part.

Roberto Di Matteo has to make changes again, not only because of being involved in so many games of late, however, also because of injury, cup ties and suspension issues.

Loanee Frank Nouble is ineligible for the tie having played earlier in the competition for West Ham.Then there will be others missing, striker Ishmael Miller (ankle), defender Marek Cech (hamstring), winger Jerome Thomas (suspended) and midfielders James Morrison (heel) and Giles Barnes (Achilles) all remain unavailable.

Di Matteo has also confirmed that youth team players will be on the bench for the match, with the Baggies boss possibly having his mind on Tuesday’s crunch Championship clash at Cardiff.

Young Graham Dorrans may be rested for tomorrow’s FA Cup clash at Reading, the Baggies midfielder who is on top form this season, is carrying a slight hip flex injury.

Although not serious, Albion boss Roberto Di Matteo may be tempted to give him a break, although still will be viewed in many quarters as the wrong thing to do with so many other forced changes coming.

Roberto Di Matteo said: “Graham Dorrans has been fantastic for us, also because he has been playing with a little injury in the last three weeks.

“I am aware of it and wary of it.

“You always try to think ‘maybe I can pull him off’, but it’s kind of difficult because he can be so influential for us.

“He’s got a little problem on his hip flex, which we’ll have to monitor.”

Di Matteo has some pedigree in the FA Cup, scoring in two finals for Chelsea back in 1997 and 2000.

“I’m not sure if it’s helped our league campaign but a win gives you confidence,” he added.

“Every win gives you confidence, whether it’s in the league or cup. It gives you a belief. It’s a nice habit.

“It’s a great competition the FA Cup in England. We’ve tried our best in previous games and that’s what we’ll do on Saturday – we’ll try to get through to the next round.”

Paddy Power are offering a free tenner bet for all new account’s and the odds available are 7/4 on Reading, 12/5 the draw and 7/5 on the Albion with 80 more bets available on the game.

Sky are offering 7/4 on Reading, 12/5 the draw and 6/4 on the Albion. They too are offering a free tenner bet, however, this is a tenner match bet.

Ladbrokes will give you 8/5 on either result with 12/5 the draw like elsewhere and are also offering West Brom Blog readers a free tenner too.

Bet 365 are now running a great new incentive where you can pick your own bonus and one that is far greater than before, get up to £200 as a starter with maybe more to follow. Their odds on the game are slightly different with 7/4 Reading, 6/4 Albion and 23/10 the draw.

Keep an eye out around the West Brom Blog for plenty of special offers at all the sports books and a few offers at online casinos and poker rooms.

FA CUP draw sees Albion versus Reading Away

The draw has been made and we are playing Reading away in the fifth round of the fa cup played weekend of 14th Feb

Albion Newcastle FA Cup 2010 team line ups

This all important FA Cup match, the third game between Albion and Newcastle, the second Hawthorns meeting this season, see’s Albion sporting an unchanged side to the one that drew 2-2 at Newcastle in the Coca-Cola Championship on Monday.

There is one Baggies change on the bench where Shelton Martis comes in for Luke Moore, who does not make the squad.

Chris Hughton makes five changes to the United side that faced Albion five days ago.

Tim Krul, Ryan Taylor, Fabrice Pancrate, Andrew Carroll and Tamas Kadar come in, with Steve Harper and Shola Ameobi dropping to the bench, and Peter Lovenkrands, Steven Taylor and Danny Simpson left out altogether.

ALBION (4-5-1): Carson; Jara, Tamas, Olsson, Cech; Brunt, Dorrans, Mulumbu, Koren, Thomas; Bednar. Subs not used: Kiely (gk), Martis, Cox, Miller, Teixeira, Mattock, Zuiverloon.

NEWCASTLE (4-5-1): Krul; R Taylor, Coloccini, Kadar, Enrique; Pancrate, Nolan, Smith, Guthrie, Gutierez; Carroll. Subs not used: Harper (gk), Ameobi, LuaLua, Ranger, Tozer, Ferguson, Donaldson.

West Brom Newcastle FA Cup preview

As Roberto Di Matteo was happy with the way his team played Monday and the fact that they could have easily come away with all three points, it seems unlikely that he will make more than the odd change if any. Even the rift between Bednar and Di Matteo over the strikers early bath which saw Bednar pulling faces and looking far from happy, they seem to have got over that episode after Roman Bednar apologised.

So, could Albion be playing just 1 up front at home? Will we be back to a weak and poor performance today? Can the Albion make progress in another FA Cup that seems to be without many of the big guns as they did when reaching Wembley a couple of years ago under the same circumstances.

Both Albion and Newcastle are flying pretty high and expecting, hoping for Premiership football next season, will this have a bearing? Who will take less risks to ensure 100% effort is available for the promotion push? Which one of the two will be thinking they can win the cup as they are on top of their form? Which set of players want to win more?

One thing is for certain, both teams will be looking for a result today, neither wants a replay, a replay that would get in the way of promotion. Certainly if it was down to the fans, a day at Wembley and taking home the FA Cup would be as good as promotion for most, however, the respective chairmen would no doubt rather have promotion and an early exit from the cup for the obvious financial implications.

The Championship title-chasers shared a 2-2 draw at St James’ Park on Monday night, the Magpies are unbeaten in 14 consecutive matches in all competitions, but have won just once in their last five, while West Brom have claimed victory in just one of their last four home matches, losing two of those.

With this in mind can anyone predict which way the game will go? Yes Albion are poor at home, especially of late, however, the fact that they came so close on Monday must mean something. Perhaps they will realise that they can beat the Toon and the home hoodoo will be cast aside. This has to be the best scenario for the players to get the home form right, playing the same team 5 days later at home after visiting them and almost winning must give them the boost they need.

The game is unlikely to be a tight affair as both are going to be fighting for the result after 90 minutes, there is likely to be goals which gives for a great chance of some easy trading on Betfair where currently you will find the Albion at 2.36, Newcastle 3.25 and the draw at 3.55. So far today there is not a lot of money available on the market, however ample to turn a good profit if you are fast.

Sky Bet are not offering such good odds with the Albion at 5-4, Newcastle and the draw both being 9-4, however, you can get a free £10 bet there as a new customer.

Bet365 are offering 13-10 on the Albion with the draw 12 – 5 and Newcastle at a very short 2-1 so if you want to back the Albion outright they are the place to go especially as they have in play betting with up to £200 in bonuses free for new West Brom Blog visitors who open an account. They have no less than 31 markets on this game including a super bet – Bednar to score first in a West Brom 2 – 1 win is on offer at 40 – 1 or 75 – 1 if you go for a 2 – 2 draw with Bednar scoring the first.

Esprit become 3rd single game shirt sponsors

The club have secured their first single game shirt sponsorship deal for a non televised match , Esprit, a local firm will have their logo emblazoned on the Albion shirts for tomorrows game against Newcastle in the FA Cup.

The West Bromwich based shop fitting and interior company are sponsoring the Club’s shirts.

They have become the third business to take advantage of the ground-breaking match by match shirt sponsorship deals Albion are now able to offer as a Football League club.

Online betting companies Blue Square and Victor Chandler have already struck similar deals with the Baggies for their games against QPR and Nottingham Forest respectively.

A fourth single match sponsorship was away to Newcastle last monday, however, this was a charitable offering by the club and not a real sponsorship deal.

All three of the previous single game shirt deals were live on Sky.

Esprit recently finished work on the clubs Merry Hill store, so it is not the first time the two have worked together.

esprit UK Managing Director, Trevor Dubberley, is quoted on the club website as saying “We are huge Albion fans and have been customers of the club for the past ten seasons in the guise of executive box holders and season ticket holders.”

“We also have branding around the stadium and sponsoring the Club’s shirt seemed the next logical step.

“I just hope we prove a lucky omen and that the team progresses into the fifth round, which would complete a proud day for esprit UK.”

Albion have only been able to offer short-term shirt sponsorship deals this season as they are not permitted under Premier League rules.

West Brom draw Plymouth or Newcastle in the FA Cup 4th round

After leaving it late to run out 2 nil winners at Huddersfield in yesterdays FA cup third round game, the Albions reward is a tie against Plymouth or Newcastle at home

West Brom were ball number 6 in the draw where Frank Skinner drew the away teams.

Goals from Dorrans and young Chris Woods secured the Baggies a place in today’s FA Cup 4th round draw.