City go down fighting. No disgrace in WBA defeat

Last updated : 21 February 2007 By Michael Morris
An empty Hawthorns 45 mins before kick off
Albion had the quality but City had the heart in a cracking game.

The difference in class showed when Mowbray brought on two new strikers on the hour and one of them, Ellington got the goal (a good one too). We just didn't have that quality available to us.

Thompson hit the bar, headed a sitter wide and underhit a lob when clean through.

Whittingham side footded wide when it looked odds on to score and he tested Kiely with a solid drive that was going in near the angle of post/bar.

There were several other very good chances for City. To be honest it was a cracking game to watch until the later stages when City were struggling but we ended the game with late pressure and the last action was a City corner that was headed away.

We were under pressure a lot and struggled to hold the ball up, Kevin McNaughton was superb at centre half, Darcy Blake and Chris Gunter did exceptionally well for rookies.

Paul Parry and Joe Ledley ran hot and cold but the committment from every single player was brilliant.

alexander made several good stops and WBA put several efforts high and wide.

Thankfully, thoughts of accepting defeat (like most supporters had before kick off), had not reached the players and they gave it a good crack against a better quality team who could afford the likes of Ellington and Gera on the bench. A team who's two strikers have over 30 goals between them and a team with Koumas in it.

Talking of Koumas, he did the Ayatollah during the game and there was good banter between the fans, especially when all parties slagged off Wolves.

The voucher pick up survived a minor hitch with incorrect times being shown on some tickets but basicaly no trouble at all and there was a relaxed atmosphere between the stewards and police when entering the ground.

No booze on sale for those who'd had a dry journey up but there were excellent Shire Foods pasties and pies.

A great game, a battling performance shame about the result but hopefully with two centre halves on the pitch and our top scorer back we may get a better result against Preston on Friday.