- Seb Sternik
- 15 November 2024
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With the international break taking centre stage, it’s time to shine some light on EFL action from League One and Two.
West Brom were formed in 1878, so are steeped in history, and have played at The Hawthorns - their home ground - since 1900.
The Baggies have won the FA Cup five times, most recently in 1968, and were crowned champions of England in the 1919/20 season.
Albion also won the Football League Cup in 1966, and their local rivals are Wolves, Aston Villa and Birmingham City.
They currently compete in the Championship, in the the second tier of the English football ladder, having been relegated there at the end of the 2020/21 Premier League season.
West Bromwich Albion early history
West Bromwich Albion FC was founded in 1878 by workers at George Salter's Spring Works. Initially, the club was named West Bromwich Strollers, but they changed their name to West Bromwich Albion as early as 1880.
In 1883, West Brom won their first trophy, the Staffordshire Cup. They also joined the FA Cup in that year. This enabled them to enter the FA Cup the following season, which was 1883/84.
The club turned professional in 1885, and the following year, they reached their first ever FA Cup final but lost to Blackburn Rovers in a replay.
Albion reached the final once again in 1887, but on this occasion, they were beaten 2-0 by their Midlands rivals, Aston Villa.
However, in 1888, West Brom finally went all the way and lifted the FA Cup trophy, beating heavy favourites Preston North End 2-1 in the final of the tournament. As a result of their FA Cup win, West Brom played a one-off Football World Championship game against Scottish Cup winners Renton, with the Baggies losing the match 4-1.
Albion were among the 12 founder members of the Football League and they won their second FA Cup trophy in 1892, beating Aston Villa 3-0 in the final.
In 1919/20, West Brom won the Football League title for the first time in their history. They were once again winners of the FA Cup in 1930/31, the same season which saw them gain promotion after having dropped down a division four years prior.
Albion were relegated once again in 1938, but after they were promoted to the top flight once more in 1948/49, they had their longest uninterrupted spell there - 24 years in the division.
Glory years and decline
Albion came agonisingly close to winning the league and cup double in 1953/54. Ultimately, they managed to win the FA Cup, but fell short in the race for the First Division title after losing form towards the end of the season. Rivals Wolverhampton Wanderers scooped up the title.
Albion remained successful in the 1950s and the 1960s. Their last major trophy to date remains the 1968 FA Cup title. In the 1980s, Albion went into severe decline. They were relegated in 1985/86 and then dropped to the Third Division for the only time in their long history five years afterwards.
West Brom in the Premier League era
Gary Megson led West Brom to the Premier League for the first time in the modern era of top flight football in England in 2001/02. Although they suffered relegation at the first attempt, they immediately bounced back, gaining promotion to the top flight.
In 2004/05, Bryan Robson led West Brom to a "great escape" from the drop zone in the Premier League. West Brom had been bottom of the table on Christmas and yet Robson was able to steer them clear of relegation. Nevertheless, West Brom were relegated the following season.
Albion featured in the Premier League once again in the 2008/09 season, but suffered immediate relegation. They won promotion in 2009/10 with Roberto Di Matteo at the helm and then stabilised in the Premier League under Di Matteo's successor, Roy Hodgson.
In 2016, long-serving owner Jeremy Peace sold the Baggies to a Chinese investment group with Lai Guochuan at the helm. West Brom were relegated from the Premier League at the end of the 2017/18 season.
Albion featured once again in the Premier League in 2020/21 after Slaven Bilic earned them promotion from the Championship during the previous season.
However, Bilic was shown the exit midway through the Premier League season and replaced by Sam Allardyce, who was unable to keep West Brom in the Premier League and then announced his own departure from the club.
Barnsley manager Valerien Ismael ultimately took over as West Brom's new head coach but failed to make an impact in their return to the Championship and was sacked and replaced by Steve Bruce in February 2022.
The 61-year-old spent a little more than eight months with the Baggies, guiding them to a disappointing tenth in the 2021/22 Championship season.
A return of just one league win from the first 13 games of the new campaign - 5-2 against Hull on August 20 - which had left them in 22nd place on only 11 points, proved fatal and he was sacked on October 10, 2022.
The former Huddersfield boss Carlos Corberan joined the club on two-and-a-half-year deal on October 25, with the club second bottom of the Championship. He guided them to a ninth-place finish in the 2022/23 season, just three points off the play-off places.
Corberan continued to improve West Brom in the 2023/24 campaign, leading them to a fifth-placed finish, but they lost to Southampton in the play-off semi-finals.
But on Christmas Eve 2024, Corberan was named as the new head coach of La Liga club Valencia.
He had guided Albion to seventh place in the Championship table, just outside the play-off places on goals scored, despite claiming his playing budget had been reduced by 30%.
West Bromwich Albion's fanbase
The official West Bromwich Albion Supporters Club was founded on 4 October 1951 and has grown to now have more than 30 branches established in many countries, including Jersey, Spain, Ireland, Malta, Australia, India and Thailand.
They are also some of the most accepting fans, having supporters groups for Punjabi supporters, those with disabilities and LGBT people.
The fans have adopted a fun tradition in recent years. To celebrate the season's end, for the last away game the fans will don a themed fancy dress.
West Bromwich Albion's rivalries
Aston Villa and Wolverhampton Wanderers are generally considered to be the natural rivals of West Brom, a fellow Midlands club.
The history between the Baggies and Aston Villa stretches back to the three FA Cup finals the two contested with each other between 1887 and 1895, where Villa came out on top by winning two out of the three finals.
However, in recent times, West Brom fans have seen Wolves as a bigger derby, as for some time, while Villa was in a different division to them, Wolves were a mainstay alongside the Baggies.
Nicknamed the Black Country derby, it is one of the longest standing derbies in world soccer, and is considered one of the fiercest rivalries in English soccer. They have played each other 160 times, with West Brom coming out the victors the most at 65 times to Wolves' 53.
The derby holds the claim as being the joint oldest in English league soccer, dating back to the inception of the English Football League in 1888. Their first major clash came two years before in 1886, when the two sides met in an FA Cup tie.
Fans from both sides claim the rivalry runs a lot deeper than football.
West Bromwich Albion's finances
Florida-based entrepreneur Shilen Patel and his father completed their takeover of West Brom in February 2024.
The deal to acquire Guochuan Lai’s 87.8 per cent majority shareholding, worth a reported £60million, had already been approved by the EFL.
The Sky Bet Championship club confirmed the formalities of the takeover by Bilkul Football WBA, LLC – a company owned by Patel and his father Kiran Patel – were completed on February 28.
“I am delighted and humbled to become the new custodian of West Bromwich Albion Football Club,” new Baggies chairman Patel told the club’s website.
“Today marks the beginning of an exciting project for the club to regain its standing as a consistent Premier League presence.
“Success does not occur overnight, but it is my ambition to build on the club’s current and historical strengths and surround West Bromwich Albion with high quality stakeholders at home and globally.”
