After making the 212 mile round trip to and from Barnsley, Many Albion fans were left disappointed after arguably the poorest Albion performance of the season.

The shape of things to come was evident after a mere two minutes, when Greening was caught in possession and Barnsley came close to scoring with only the right hand post coming to Albion's aid. This was promptly followed by the first of many things to go wrong for Cesar, when he managed to clash heads with Hoefkens on the edge of the 18 yard box.

I will not be making yet another match report; it’s highly unlikely that I could make it any more diverse than any of the newspaper articles that have already been written. However, as one of the many Albion fans to attend the game, an impressive 4000 I might add, and after reading the recent article 'To boo or not to boo' I think that it is important to follow up with what the author of that article was saying.

--Booing--

When the half time whistle blew, despite the poor performance from the team, I was somewhat surprised to hear boo's ring out from certain sections of the crowd... Ok we were 2-0 down, but that being said... how can booing the team or booing Mowbray possibly help the team? If anything its going to make their morale even worse! It's not like we haven’t won for a few games and sitting in the bottom 3 now is it? And frankly, how can Mowbray possibly be blamed for a comedy of errors on the pitch from certain players?

Another recent report I read from the Birmingham Post also baffled me somewhat, the opening paragraph was about how the Barnsley fans were chanting "Premier League, Your Having a Laugh!"... Which game was this reporter at? The Barnsley crowd were barely heard and the ground was only half full? there was almost no atmosphere at all once the Albion faithful stopped to take a breath and I think the only audible chant that could be heard from Barnsley fans was the occasional "you don’t know what your doing" aimed at the officials. Just to hammer home the point here, the match attendance was 13,000ish? And an astonishing 4,000 of those at the match were Albion fans, thanks to the club's generous 'Free Coach Trip of The Season' scheme.

I think to sum up Albion's game, there were poor performances from players in key areas of the pitch, and below is a list of players that usually, and should, be the strong central spine of the team.

--Dean Kiely--

This was a poor game for the Irishman and he was visibly disappointed with himself after disappearing down the tunnel quicker than you could say "I dropped another cross" at the final whistle, His communication with the central defenders seemed poor at the best of times, his kicking was poor all game and he never looked comfortable even in his own 6 yard area. I think the tip of the iceberg really was when in the 60th minute. He finally came out to catch a cross and the Albion fans gave an ironic cheer to which Kiely responded by turning round and telling them to buzz off... well, somewhat a little less politely than that. Personally I think this was a little silly and I think many of the fans will have lost respect for him after that reaction.

--Bostjan Cesar--

As mentioned earlier, his performance seemed doomed after just 6 minutes with a clash of heads and it seemed to just fall apart from there, he was at fault for the first goal and picked up yet another silly yellow card in the first half.

--Jonathan Greening--

This was a nightmare game for the skipper and he will want to work hard over the next few days to put it right, many of his passes went astray and he just didn’t seem to settle into the central role, often being second to the ball. Could it be fatigue setting in after playing in near enough every game so far this term?

--Kevin Phillips--

'Super Kev' never really got into the game and his usually immaculate touch let him down on several occasions, quite honestly... he looked like a 34 year old who had played 30+ games.

--Overview--

Albion never looked likely to win this game from the off, and it's because the 4 players above who form the spine of the team, did not perform to their best, other players were also below par for the game, Robinson had another shocker and got himself another silly booking towards the end of the game with a rash challenge, and Brunt just didn’t seem to be able to work his magic either. The only players to really come away from the game with any credit were Barnett and Teixeira who both had solid performances.

I’m sure Mowbray will assess the players again before Tuesday night's game against Sheffield Utd and I wouldn’t be too surprised if we saw some changes to the starting XI. Only time will tell! But I’m sure the Baggies will hope to Boing Boing back and get the result we need to keep the pressure on at the top of the table!

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