West Brom boss holds talks with duo after tough week
Albion head coach Carlos Corberan held individual talks with Cedric Kipre and Nathaniel Chalobah after a turbulent week for the pair.
Central defender Kipre was handed an opening-day start at Blackburn last weekend but was guilty of losing the ball for Rovers’ second – and eventually decisive – goal.
Chalobah is one of only two Albion players to start both games so far, defeats at Ewood Park and Stoke, but was involved in an incident with a travelling supporter at the Bet365 Stadium, which later in the week drew an apology from the midfielder.
Corberan has called on his players to be brave and to take risks with the ball. If they fail to come off, he wants them to forget about it and the boss will assume responsibility. He said Kipre’s costly pass last week was just the first error in three in Blackburn’s goal. The head coach stressed he holds meetings, team and individual, with players so they understand the context about when to play short or longer, more or less risky football.
On Thursday, the Spaniard questioned Kipre whether his error at Ewood Park would affect him or whether he would continue trying to operate as Corberan demands.
“We are not stupid,” Corberan said. “When a mistake happens, you cannot do anything. We have to be calm, we have to analyse why it happened so that we can help the player to reduce the mistakes.
“During the game the players need to be brave – that means taking responsibilities. As a team we have to prevent mistakes.
“If you analyse the goals we conceded…in football, you can have one mistake with one action. The problem is when you have the second in a row.
“The worst mistake of the game that day was the Kipre pass, but in this mistake, the worst we had, we could still manage it better – with Kipre having more calm to manage the situation. He went too much to the ball and the player passed behind him. Still, then we have Alex (Palmer) to protect the goal. The finish wasn’t in the centre corridor of the pitch.
“When in football you concede a goal, to concede it from the centre, the keeper is at a disadvantage. The next one, from the sides, they lose the angle and the keeper can control the goal. What was the problem?
“We didn’t prevent or couldn’t solve the mistake – first Kipre’s position and then without the intervention of Alex.
“I don’t want to see my players play with mistakes. That’s why we have a lot of meetings. It’s important for the players to understand the advantage – where is it? Is it playing short, or between the lines, or playing it far?
“My work is to make them understand every game situation. In that moment, they need to forget the mistakes. I take responsibilities as a coach. If we are going to be dominant, they have to take risks and I am responsible for them. Yes.
“I had a conversation with Kipre. I said to him ‘is the mistake going to affect you or not? Are you able to still show everything, that is a lot? Or are you going to be inhibited for the fact that you made this mistake?’”
“The big players make mistakes, show personality and they keep going. I want to have my players with me. This is a point of how I manage the players – I will accept the mistake of Kipre, for example, but I will not accept the lack of effort from my team.
“Kipre’s mistake has a limit in time. My mistakes as a coach have limits in time. If I continue leaving my technical area in the Championship, I cannot coach.
“We need to learn from mistakes. I know the conditions and I know they’ll learn, but what I’ll never accept is the lack of effort in the team.”
Chalobah, last January’s signing from Fulham, has struggled for regular minutes and form – something he admitted himself in Thursday’s social media apology – at Albion and let emotions spill over in the Potteries.
Corberan added: “For me, our fans are the people we need to respect the most in the club,” Corberan said. “They know the meaning of our work. I was talking with Chalobah.
“Many times, I respect the decision of the fans – when they like me, when they don’t like me. It’s part of my job. I can be criticised when something doesn’t work how they’d like, they’ll show me a lot of love when things work well. I will always do my best to make them proud.
“For these fans, to support the team, they were making a massive effort – financially, buying tickets and travelling to support the team. This means we have to respect them a lot, whether we like what they say or whether we don’t. It’s part of our salary to respect these opinions and to manage with emotional control.
“He knows and he knows that he didn’t do that in the best way. His reaction was to one person and it was not against the fans of West Bromwich – but you cannot do that even against one person.
“You can never do that. It’s part of our responsibilities. It’s why I accepted the second yellow card (in Blackburn dismissal) because I threw the bottle. Part of the behaviour is respect. His behaviour is why he said sorry, because he cannot do this.
“I think it was a very honest behaviour from him to do this, to make a public statement, an apology and I would like to see this level of humility from my players. He was honest in his comments.
“That is the emotion that is behind everybody in this game. It has been a positive step from him, and I’m proud to see the reaction from him. We need to learn from our mistakes.”
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