Albion contract talks, Corberan meetings and the key change post Lai (original) (raw)
The transfer window may only have closed relatively recently, but already West Bromwich Albion are looking forward. In a recruitment sense, the work never truly stops; head of football operations Ian Pearce and his team, who now work in tandem with Bilkul's Andrew Nestor having assumed sporting director responsibilities, are already planning for the transfer windows appearing on the horizon.
Albion can be pleased with the business they conducted in the summer, although they're still yet to fully feel the benefits; Torbjorn Heggem has been a success story, but others have had to wait their turn - and indeed continue to do so, in certain cases. Carlos Corberan has depended heavily on a core group of players which has largely been complemented by those imports.
The existing personnel have been key under Corberan in challenging at the desirable end of the Championship almost entirely since the Spaniard arrived, but for Corberan, Pearce, Nestor and chairman Shilen Patel, key decisions await in the coming months which will affect a host of first choice players and greatly impact the existing squad, which was boosted in the summer by the extensions agreed by Alex Mowatt and Kyle Bartley.
Albion expertly manoeuvred deals in the summer to ensure they didn't miss out on transfer fees earned through the sales of Okay Yokuslu, Brandon Thomas-Asante and Conor Townsend; all three players were heading into the final years of their respective contracts and the Baggies struck while the iron was hot to refresh the dressing room and free up space on the wage-bill.
Still, the operation would've been a seismic one; if Albion had sold every player in the summer who was heading into their final year, the task to adequately replace all of those who'd left might've been too great. As such, five senior players remain at the club, and each of them especially important to Corberan, who are currently into the final year of the deals they agreed upon arrival.
Darnell Furlong has been at the club since 2019 and is one of the longest-serving players in the squad, a player who in his late 20s is enjoying the best spell of his time as an Albion player. Semi Ajayi also arrived that summer and, with Furlong, formed a defence which secured promotion to the Premier League under Slaven Bilic. In and out of the side by comparison to Furlong, he has been integral this term.
Jayson Molumby is still only 25 and has been the legs and the bite in midfield since arriving in 2021 from Brighton for a comparably nominal fee. John Swift has been key, despite the injury issues he suffered last season, to Corberan. Grady Diangana is in the fifth and final year of the contract he signed when moving permanently from West Ham in 2020. Right there, you have a cluster of extremely important players to Corberan and the club.
The hourglass is emptying. Decisions must be made in the not too distant future and yet, simultaneously, how honestly can decisions be made with so much uncertainty? Albion want to be playing Premier League football next term, and the very division they find themselves in come next August will determine what sort of contracts they're able to offer - as well as the actual players they'll consider retaining.
"As a coach I always give my opinion to the people in the club, to Andrew and to Ian too," Corberan says, when asked by BirminghamLive how the club is approaching the matter. "We always have meetings to update how we are seeing the squad, the players growing, it's good to have these conversations.
"They know my opinion and we put our opinions in common. One of the considerations the club is doing is this, to start to work on not only the short-term, but the medium to long-term. This is a big change to the past - something the club is doing."
That, in itself, is a positive - no such approach was mapped out by the club before Patel and his associates arrived at the club when they took over from the otherwise absent Guochuan Lai and Corberan has welcomed the change which enables him to do his job on the training pitch and on the touch-line, but also share the burden of responsibility on the administrative front.
That has involved Corberan, Patel, Nestor and Pearce, as well as managing director Mark Miles, making important decisions for the betterment of the club in due course. Now, there is a visible thinktank present at The Hawthorns which wasn't previously evident.
"We share lots of opinions," Corberan continues. "With Shilen and Andrew we enjoy a lot working with them because they create a positive collective mentality. Shilen, from the first day, wanted to manage the club in the same way he manages another business. He believes in the people he put in the club and the people he put in need to talk, to arrive to conclusions, that's the way.
"In the end there are people who make the last decision, but from the people we had here before, now with Andrew and Shilen, with his project to not just be thinking year-by-year, half-season to half-season, it is thinking about creating something special in the club, is to make these decisions in the right moment."
As for those five senior players, who at this moment in time head the list of those whose deals are due to expire next spring, decisions await - but it's a process which isn't only a one-way relationship. Corberan, who understands what it means to be a professional footballer and the uncertainties and insecurities which can arise, points out that players can possess differing mindsets in such scenarios.
"Some players want security, some players want risk, some players want to change, some want to stay," he adds. "Some players hate to be in the last year of their contract and want to avoid this. Some players say they are in their last year so they want to be open to possibilities - everyone is different."