'Patience is a Virtue'. WBA 2025/26 Preseason Review.

"Meet the new boss, same as the old boss...?"

A new season and a new adventure is about to begin.

And for me, a key word must be emphasized.

Stability.

For way too long, the Baggies management merry go round has seemingly been piloted by someone hydrating on Red Bull.

10 years.

10 different managers.

The appointment of Ryan Mason, has hopefully brought a sense of long term objectives for a club in the throes of question marks in a decade of debatable clarity of vision.

The 'cutting your cloth' mentality will be paramount this season as the woes of previous regimes myopic, the reckless ways olde, will of course have to be a pay a price paid down the road.

This exact path we will inevitably tread this season.

Shilen Patel’s 30 Million investment in last year's accounts pretty much saved us, but an overall 34 Million loss, a literal inevitability from poor planning and being cut adrift from the safety net of parachute payments, allied to last season The Baggies having the third highest wage bill in the Championship.

Of course, drastic and much needed changes had to be made.

The ill advised gamble of investing in high expense, low returns from the mercurial pair of Grady Diangana and Jon Swift ultimately failed, and were duly and correctly released, [ in the annals of ‘that being so Albion, what are the chances of a Swift free kick and a Will Lankshear header v us for Oxford Utd next season?]

And short term loans bite the hand that feeds if the gamble fails, for example the evidence of what we paid for Mason Holgate and Adam Armstrong on salaries alone are hugely impactful, expensive risks that reaped such little reward.

Holgate was apparently the sixth highest earner in The Championship last season.

The notion of paying high salaries for Premier League loanees unable to find a role with their host club, is undoubtedly an angle we have to avoid for any possible financial sustainability.

Selling your best players of course weakens and disheartens in equal measure, I’m personally still rue selling Robbo and Remi to Big Ron and the behemoth that is Man U.

And that was 44 years ago in October!

Losing Alex Palmer for a relatively bargain price, was of course evidence of the mire we find ourselves in, and the desperate need for income.

The urgency of book balancing will obviously have repercussions.

As I type this, Torbjorn Heggem is in talks with Italian Cup Winners, Bologna over a 10 Million transfer, which would represent probably the only sustainable way out of the tentacles of FFP stipulations, but would leave the Baggies defence shorn of it’s best and most flexible defender.

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Being left sided maximizes the difficulty of filling this sizable Norwegian gap, that may well become a chasm this season.

I highlighted Heggem's strength's prior to his signing last season, simply a brilliant piece of scouting and recruiting by Nestor's Bilkul Group and the obvious way forward as a management model as Brighton and Brentford have proven.

The secret to their success is a contingency plan for replacement, it's to be seen how our planning may work.

Replacing Palmer was a case in point, and always will be when you are dealing with one of the best positional players in their roles in a division, the exact same scenario with Heggem.

In essence, it becomes a straight choice between Josh Griffiths and Joe Wildsmith, it’ll be fascinating to see who Boaz Myhill may advise Ryan Mason to be the starter.

Both 'keepers have strengths and weaknesses, and if it’s ever the year for one of them to step up this is it?

For me, I’d take Griffiths to mature into the role, this will be his 14th year at The Albion, joining us as an eleven year old and if ever the time is right to make your claim to keep the Baggies gloves, it’s now.

And on the subject of goalkeepers, MASSIVE KUDOS to Hannah Hampton, one of the Lionesses best players, possibly the most amazing inside story to success, and of course a fellow Baggie! No doubt Hannah's ovation will be sustained and deserved when she attends one of the August fixtures and gets introduced to the Albion faithful.

Defensively, with Heggem’s seemingly inevitable departure, no doubt the impact of the new signings will be pivotal to any success this season.

Ryan Mason clearly sees Darnell Furlong as his leader, making him skipper for the pre-season, maybe it’s a case of a clean sheet and convincing the new boss?

Defence is all about stability and it seems the right side will be Furlong and new signing Nat Phillips, whose strength of character, defensive nous and commitment should ensure he’s a good signing.

Semi Ajayi is now at Hull City and effectively replaced by Caleb Taylor, whose loan move experiences have hopefully set himself up to achieve at Championship level.

It’s an unrelenting, testing division and for Taylor, really the moment of truth.

Kyle Bartley, at 34 years old, triggering an appearance based clause to activate a new one year contract in April, took us all by surprise, and although has been made open to offers for his services, nothing has yet materialized, and with Heggem leaving, may yet find another year playing for The Albion.

Our last central defending option is the under the radar signing of George Campbell from CF Montreal, a player I’ve seen over here in the US, [you can hardly miss him with a build like that!], a very smooth athlete, physically very strong, who from my many MLS sources, told directly, will be an asset for us, for the reasons stated above, but may take time to bed in.

The way our defence is looking with Heggem departing, Campbell may well be in the team sooner rather than later, Mason had Campbell playing at full back, as a converted midfielder, George certainly has the skillset.

A Mason defensive option at times, may well be a back three where Ousmane Diakite fitted so seamlessly in a cameo appearance last season v Sheffield Utd.

Diakite looks a more confident player in preseason and certainly a fascinating character, who can play the deep lying midfield role to aplomb and his athleticism and flexibility will be much called upon this season to come.

Left back woes may well be a by-product of losing Heggem, who covered brilliantly in central defence as well as started the season so encouragingly in his early Albion appearances.

Part of that necessity was playing to Callum Styles strengths, not a natural left back, but at his best pushing out of position, being creative, seeing the game higher up the pitch as part of an attacking threat.

There is no doubt about Styles ability, simply, where do you play him to best deploy his undoubted strengths?

Having Heggem as cover at times, really made a difference.

Natural left sided defenders are so hard to find.

Or replace.

But of course, if it’s players to be sold to a higher level of football, the options of Baggies targets really comes down to a quartet.

Heggem

Fellows

Price

Maja

There is talk, we may indeed have to lose two of them.

Reality bites.

In terms of age, potential and position played, Fellows or Price will be the highest priced.

Maja’s injury record and being at the end of his contract in June 2026, despite his undoubted ability and amazingly being only 26 years old, is bound to have an impact on his value.

Tom Fellows, Euro U21’s winner.

It sounds so good, and could not have happened to a better character and a truer Baggie.

Tom is of course the embodiment of the Albion tradition of creative wingers, who generate such excitement and enticement of the prospect of what is about to happen when they get possession of the ball.

Tom was the joint top creative force in The Championship with fourteen assists from a team that is not rife with goalscorers.

Simply put, one goal in four last season for The Baggies had the hallmark Fellows assist.

And all this, without a consistent target as striker, post Maja injury.

 Tom is a very specific player, if attacking width is in your teams DNA, there aren’t many to compare as young wingers.

I would have loved to have seen Tom have more minutes in the Euros to see the impact he could make at the next level of football with higher quality players around him and competing against.

Talking of next level, Isaac Price has had such an eye opening impact, nine goals for Northern Ireland in just 22 appearances.

To put this into perspective, Price has exactly the same amount of goals as the greatest Northern Irish player of all time, the inimitable George Best.

To put into perspective how hot Price’s goal scoring feat has recently been, his winner v Iceland in June 2025 meant he’d scored seven goals in seven months for Northern Ireland.

Price is one of those on his debut for The Albion, it was very obvious we had a very gifted technical player allied to superb stamina and this value observation has only increased, Isaac's progress perhaps only stymied by at times playing out of position when the squad has been stretched, his loan striker role away to Bristol City was tough to watch.

 Price is just 21 years old, it’s astounding what he’s achieved on the international stage, and such a huge impact from so few games for us, one of those you’d hope would stay, but may well be a short visit as a Baggie with a huge profit for the Hawthorns coffers when we inevitably sell.

The creative hubs of Price and Fellows, have to be placated by the engine room, and it looks at this stage the two M’s will be manning this station again, Molumby and Mowatt.

Of course, both players have their strengths and weaknesses.

Molumby’s unflinching commitment to the cause and energy is undeniable, but which Jayson will raise their head this season?

The battle between controlled aggression and going too far is something you feel will be bubbling away again in the Molumby head and psyche, not to lose your edge v not to losing your self control, seemingly an ongoing battle.

Mowatt talks about the difficulties of last season openly, ‘last season being one extreme to another’, in terms of coaching styles and characters therein, but also how impressed he’s been by Mason’s, "training intensity and being high on standards^"

Hopefully Mowatt can take those words into consistent applications, but it’ll be very interesting to see how the central midfield evolves, with Diakite hopefully being a more than viable alternative this season.

Mikey Johnston was off to the Brazilian climes of Flamengo, as sources in both countries reported, in what would have been a ground breaking transfer, but the richest club in Brazil’s faithful didn’t seem so keen and the 5 Mil transfer was aborted.

Looks like Flamengo have gone to more traditional bases for their summer spending sprees, purchasing from the likes of Atletico Madrid and AC Milan in recent days,

For Mikey, reportedly, not overtly upset at the end of this aborted samba sojourn, it looks like a two way fight between him and Karlan Grant.

Grant was superb early last season, and took time to return to the same form from his long term injury, Mikey, who was brilliant in his initial loan spell from Celtic, seven goals in twenty games, struggled a bit more on his permanent transfer, just three goals and five assists last season from double the amount of appearances.

It’s good to have choices in positions.

Grant, like Maja is out of contract in June 2026, so losing our two most clinical finishers as free agents at the end of this season, is a real worry for Ryan Mason to act upon and solve.

Strikers.

It's a small group.

Of course we all know Josh Maja’s strengths, from an opening day hattrick in a 39 Minute spell v QPR, creating so much excitement for the season ahead. Baggies momentum seemed rife.

We started SO well.

The first six games we’d accrued sixteen points, the only draw v the eventual champions, Leeds Utd

But of course, a season is a marathon not a sprint, the other 40 games was 1.2 points per game with a grand total of 48 points accrued.

You can argue the writing was on the wall before Maja’s injury, certainly afterwards we weren’t the same team, missing massively in an imbalanced squad, a player to replicate Josh's unique role in the team.

The fact this is now eight months since Maja started a game since his ankle injury is very worrying considering also his lengthy spell out from 2023/24, [at least no Dan Ballard to worry about next season].

Injuries have of course blighted Daryl Dike, who I considered so talented when we signed him, and despite best intentions and diligent work in the gym to recover from two  horrific Achilles Tendon injuries, it seems like Daryl’s body cannot get a break, unless it’s to itself.

It’s such a grim scenario, to be injured again in training, and set to miss the first month of this season, for a player who is just 25 years old.

Mentally as well as spiritually, to keep having these setbacks is heartbreaking, and seems fatefully following the career path of his brother, Bright Dike, who was thriving at Portland Timbers, when a first ACL injury at aged 24 years, was the beginning of the end for him, receiving a second ACL two seasons later.

You just wish for the best for Daryl, but The Championship is such a 46 game slog, with such little recovery time between games, his future is a real worry and of course another out of contract player at the end of this season.

Looking at the Heggem transfer bubble, it may well be a much longer wait before we ever see two Norwegians in the same Baggies XI for an official match, and looks no doubt that new signing Aune Heggebo has a huge role to play this season and certainly a five year contract is a statement of intent.

Scandinavian players tend to be reliable, have diligent work ethic and good technique and Heggebo’s performance v Rayo Vallecano had hallmarks of all of those classic and respected traits.

Apart from one poor season in 2022/23, Heggebo’s goal scoring record is quite encouraging, the key will be his adaptability to life in the Championship, and perhaps how he can feed off the dual threats from wide positions that Albion possess.

Another worry is Tammer Bany, who looks like the proverbial playground, free spirited player, looking to cause mischief whenever on the ball and in his cameo appearances has looked promising.

But the way the Albion are in recent years, all we need is another injury plagued player, and after making just four sub appearances since he signed in Feb 2025.

Ryan Mason confessed this week,

 "..a lot of energy has been spent on Dike and Bany, and ultimately it’s not worked".

Words you can say are plainly true.

This may well be the season when young home grown players with a point to prove make a huge impression as the Mason squad inevitably thins, so opportunities will surface.

The two players most ready to bridge this gap, in my opinion, are Harry Whitwell and Cole Deeming.

Both are physically ready for the rigours of this division, have seemingly excellent technique and game time will only prepare them more for a future as a Baggie.

Deeming at just 18 years old, in particular I think has huge potential.

And with potential, where will The Albion finish next season?

Ipswich have invested and retooled and have a strong Albion contingent from keeper Palmer to skipper, O’Shea and of course Townsend will be a loyal squad player, and are rightly favourites for promotion.

The bookies often get their odds wrong, but I think West Brom at 25/1 to win the division, is very much a heart over head bet.

There are simply SO many X Factors.

To sustain a promotion run you need goals, and we’ve lacked a prolific, consistently fit striker for years.

And goals we’ll need, when you take the best two components of your defensive unit away from a team that started last season, Alex Palmer and potentially Heggem.

It’s bound to have an impact.

Loans of course can come in and impact, but we’ve missed the jackpot in recent years to say the very least!

Look at last season amongst others?

Racic. 

Dobbin.

Holgate.

Armstrong.

The season before.

M’Vila

Pipa

Chalobah

Marshall

I know there are only so many Harvey Barnes, but that was seven years ago.

We simply have to impact that loanee category to a far better degree than the recent past.

Albion has undoubted strengths.

But simply put, can we keep them all?

Of course, no.

I see this season as a rebuild and patience very much needed as a new, inexperienced manager, who will undoubtedly make an impact at the club, charts a new future and a new Baggies team emerges.

I realistically see us finishing out of the play offs possibly in 10th, but will be delighted to be proven wrong.