00:00Hello, Bagley's fans. Welcome to ExpressingStyle.com. My name is Jonny Drury and I'm here with
00:13a little bit of a preview for tomorrow night's game. Albion take on Fleetwood in the first
00:18round of the EFL Cup. The first time Albion have ever played Fleetwood Town, so they've
00:23come up through sort of non-league. They've been a regular in the AFL in recent years,
00:26but Albion have never crossed their paths. The first time will be tomorrow night at the
00:31Highbury Stadium, as Albion make the trip north after that fantastic opening win against
00:37QPR in the Championship on Saturday. And in terms of tomorrow night, we know that there's
00:42going to be very much a different side to the one that we saw at Loftus Road. My sort
00:50of overriding prediction is we'll see 11 changes. We'll see a completely different side starting
00:54the game tomorrow night against Fleetwood, which will largely be made up of Albion youngsters
01:00and the new signings who either we haven't seen so far in a couple of cases and the ones
01:06who made sort of cameo appearances down in West London on Saturday. So just got a bit
01:11of a bit of a run through, a bit of a prediction over who will play. I think in terms of the
01:15new signings, it's pretty clear that the most will play. I imagine Joe Wildsmith will start
01:21in goal, played at Cambridge in the penultimate pre-season game with a young Albion side.
01:28He will take the cluffs and I imagine Ted Kan will be on the bench. I imagine it'll
01:32be a night off for Alex Palmer and a night off for the majority of the players that we
01:38saw, certainly from the start at QPR on Saturday. In terms of the back four, it's going to be
01:44interesting how Albion sort of make up. In terms of the players, we're pretty sure will
01:48Caleb Taylor is one that we're very sure will come in. Whether he goes out on loan after
01:53signing a new contract before the end of the transfer, that remains to be seen. But I imagine
01:57he will play centre-half and we're pretty sure that Paddy McNair will play. We haven't
02:02seen him in a friendly or an Albion shirt just yet. He's been working up to his fitness
02:06since arriving on loan from San Diego. Carlos Corbijn said after the game, you can read
02:11some quotes in tomorrow's Express and Star that if he gets through training okay over
02:15the weekend, I know Albion were in training on Sunday and McNair was training, so if he
02:20got through that okay, he will play at least 45 minutes. As will Gianluca Frabotta, came
02:25off the bench very late at Loftus Road, but he will play at least 45 minutes.
02:31Making up that back four is quite interesting. There's a lot of youngsters, a lot of full-backs,
02:35you know, different positions as well, who've sort of featured in pre-season. One of them
02:39is Diego Nelson, who's been at Albion since about the age of 13. Probably someone who
02:44to the majority of Albion fans won't be that well known, but he played a number of times
02:49in pre-season and featured. As a right-back, you know, now Ethan Ingram has left the football club,
02:54now obviously Pippa Sloan ended. There is no sort of designated or backup right-back that springs
03:02to mind and Nelson has played a bit, so I imagine he is very much in line to get the nod at Fleetwood
03:07tomorrow evening. I imagine Corbijn will play a 4-2-3-1, that's kind of his sort of stock system.
03:13If that's the case for the back four, one of them will be Ousmane Diakite, he came off the bench
03:18at QPR. He will play, I'm pretty sure of that. Alongside him there are options, people like Kevin
03:23Mfambe, but Harry Whitwell is another one who played. He wasn't in the squad, wasn't one of
03:29the three youngsters who travelled to QPR on Saturday, but he has played an awful lot of
03:33football in pre-season and I know he's someone we saw a little bit of last year in the Cup,
03:38sitting against Aldershot. So, he's very much in line and if he was one of the youngsters to
03:44be selected tomorrow evening, I wouldn't be surprised by that. Ahead of them, Lewis Dobbin
03:48is a winger who came in last week on loan from Villa. It's highly likely he will play from the
03:53start. Aswell Devante Cole, I imagine he will lead the line, came off the bench for sort of
03:5820-25 minutes at QPR. He sort of needs minutes of the leg, so he will play. Aside from that,
04:05Fenton Hurd was a player who was among the substitutes, someone who has been around the
04:09first team for quite a while now. It would be interesting to see if he plays in the 10 role,
04:13he's one of the names that springs to mind. Then on the other wing, we're looking at other
04:18youngsters, you could say the likes of Reyes Cleary, although he's probably more of a striker.
04:21But one name who I'll be a fan of, might have seen, I sort of wrote about a few weeks ago,
04:26is Oli Bostock. 17-year-old, handed a professional contract just months into his scholarship. He's
04:33been a sort of Wales youth captain, very, very highly rated within the coaching set-up in the
04:38academy at West Brom. He played an awful lot of football as well in pre-season, arguably more
04:43than some of the PL2 players, the under-21 players. So, it wouldn't be a surprise to see him line up.
04:49But there are other names in there we could see, sort of on the bench. Rhys Hall was on the bench
04:55at QPR. There are other players, the likes of Fellows, sorry not Fellows, I imagine Fellows
05:00will be on the bench. I've just named a few, Fellows, Swift, Maggia, Ajayi, the likes who
05:07you may expect may be on the bench, because they'll want a bit of experience to throw on there
05:12at Fleet if they need it. But there are a number of other names. Mo Fowle is another player as well,
05:17who's probably going to be involved in some form or another. And for Carlos Corberham,
05:23you always want to do well in competitions. But given the situation at the moment,
05:26that he has mentioned a number of times, the financial restrictions that Albia are working
05:30or working under, shall I say, in terms of bringing players in and the need to bring more
05:35players in. If Albion were to go out at Fleetwood on Tuesday night, even though this is something
05:38probably supporters don't want to hear, and us as probably reporters don't want to hear,
05:42because we want to see Albion have a good cup run. But it's not a priority. Certainly the
05:46League Cup anyway falls at the bottom of the pack in order. So, if this young Albion side,
05:52this new Albion side in terms of new signings, if they can go and get a result at Fleetwood
05:55on Tuesday, fantastic. But I think it's going to be more a case of rest in the first team players
06:00and having a little look at the other options that he's got, while also getting the minutes
06:05in the legs of his new signings.
Comments