Former West Brom favourite Paul Robinson backs Carlos Corberan to get Albion firing
Former Albion favourite Paul Robinson sees a “big season” ahead for boss Carlos Corberan – and predicts he can get the Baggies firing.
The Hawthorns head coach is leading training at St George’s Park as he prepares his troops in what is a first full campaign in charge.
Both Albion and Millwall, where former full-back Robinson, 44, is first-team coach, missed out on the Championship play-offs on the final day of last term. Corberan took over Albion slumped near the bottom of the second tier last October and while Robinson admits the Spaniard will face extra challenges in a full season, he backed the head coach to click Albion into gear.
“When a new manager comes in you want that spark, you want him to lift the mood from what it was,” Robinson told the Express & Star. “He does that, Carlos, obviously he has his own ways with how he does it, I don’t know how he does it, but he seems to get teams going in the right direction, he did it at Huddersfield, just missing out in the play-off final, he does good jobs.
“Now is a big season for him, he’d probably want a bit more power, for him to bring in a few more players to go into the new season, that might be a bit of a worry for him.
“But he gets his players firing, he gets his players in a good place – they are always tough teams to play against, Carlos teams, especially when you know they are in good form.”
Robinson has been working under Gary Rowett since 2021. Rowett was one of the managers linked with The Hawthorns vacancy prior to Corberan’s move.
“He’s had this whole pre-season to work on how he wants the team to play,” Robinson said. “Whereas before he’s come into a squad not really his, he had to find a way to get the team firing and in winning ways.
“From the positive side of it he’s had most of last season and a full pre-season to work the players how he wants and what he expects and now it’s about results – football’s always about results.
“He might be looking over his shoulder a little bit, he’s been linked with Leeds, didn’t get that job, will he get much backing? Keeping players fit again will be key because he’s not going to have the money to get players to help the squad. It’ll be interesting to see how he deals with those things.”
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