It wasn’t a great start to 2026 for the Baggies as they suffered a second half defeat to Swansea City that now puts us 18th in the Championship and our 9th successive away defeat on the road where this is the worst in 50 years.
An early start on New Years Day as I travelled to Swansea to watch our first away game of 2026 hoping we can turn our away woes around after a narrow 2-1 win over QPR on Monday night, that would of gave us a confidence boost. However, it continues as we suffered on the road for the 9th successive time and surely pressure is on for Ryan Mason right now?
First half, there were a few opportunities but mainly Swansea had a few chances from a free-kick from Josh Tymon to open the scoring but was goalless after 45 minutes.
The Baggies had a few chances where Diakite saw his effort stopped where Iling-Junior’s shot was saved by Swansea’s keeper Lawrence Vigouroux.
In the second-half, the Baggies started brightly where Karlan Grant’s strike was pushed away and Mikey Johnston’s near post didn’t beat Vigouroux as the Baggies tried their best to break the deadlock that didn’t come.
The game changed from 15 minutes from time where Fulton gave Swansea the lead through a long-range attempt but looked like it should of been disallowed where Diakite was fouled prior to the goal.
The Baggies nearly had a injury-time equaliser where a header from a throw in came and the ball looked in my distance went over the line but the referee marked it as offside.
Swansea City 1-0 West Brom
Goalscorer for Swansea City: Jay Fulton
Another away game the same story, it goes on a 9th concessive defeat I don’t know if I’m cursed for going to all these away games this season or not. This defeat puts us 18th in the Championship and it’s our worst season so far since 1999-2000, I don’t know why the board cannot act and make a decision already as I cannot see what Ryan Mason brings to the side.
We have afforded to sack Tony Mowbray last season and bring in players over the summer in Aune Heggebo, Nat Phillips and George Campbell and bring in a inexperienced manager on a 3 year contract, so if we afforded it 9 months ago why can’t we afford it now due to PSR issues, I would take the risk to do it right now if I was Andrew Nestor or Shilen Patel.
Our attention would focus on Leicester City away on Monday where this should be marked as El-Sackico as both managers are under pressure.