Boss concentrates on points not promotion

Albion boss Tony Mowbray has urged both players and supporters to forget 'promotion' - for the time being. The Baggies are in a rich vein of form recording victories in their last four out of fives games with an amazing 16 goals scored in the process. However the league leaders will see their credentials severely tested in coming weeks with away fixtures at a formidable Portman Road and the journey north to a Hull side only a point outside the Play-off places.

Mowbray realises that with the Baggies sitting only three points clear of second place Watford and third place Bristol City, the table could change drastically after a couple of adverse results.

"All we're talking about is accumulating points," Mowbray stressed.

"Promotion is just a word which gets stuck on the end if you get enough points to finish in the top two.

"We realise we're going to have to get as many as 90 points or at least in the high eighties.

"There is a long way to go and we don't want to get sidetracked by words like 'promotion'.

"Why would anybody want to put any extra pressure on themselves?

"If we had lost against Scunthorpe, and then lost the tough game we have at Ipswich, all of a sudden we could have been fifth or sixth.

"I'd like to think I'm realistic enough to know we are only ever a defeat away from a potential crisis if you start building yourself up too much.

"All we are doing at this moment in time is building up points and ticking along - just like everybody else is.

"Again, at this moment in time, the points we have accrued have put us top of the table.

"But let's see where we are at the end of January, and then the end of February, and so on.

"We've got to keep it going."