Boring Boring Baggies

 Tony Pulis’s dour approach saw crowds falling at The Hawthorns as fans fell out of love with their team 

- Paul Rees

WEST BROMWICH ALBION

Twice of late I have been made joyful from hearing that overbearing men had lost their jobs. The first time was occasioned by the non-coup that forced Robert Mugabe from power in Zimbabwe, the second Tony Pulis’s sacking as head coach of West Bromwich albion. It was the latter’s reckoning that brought me the most glee. Why, I even did a jig at the news.

The dour Welshman might not have ruined an entire nation, at least not yet, but his near three-year reign at The Hawthorns had a demoralising effect on me. I hold Pulis responsible for extinguishing the peculiar, though fervent and deep-rooted, passion I had retained for the Baggies for nearly half a century and through considerably more thin than thick. Given the decline in albion’s home attendances that followed his appointment in January 2015, I am evidently not alone in this regard.