Carlos Corberan using World Cup to build West Brom relationships

Albion’s squad jet out to the Costa Blanca for a one-week training camp later this month while the top two tiers in English football break for the World Cup in Qatar.

Corberan, who has just passed three weeks in The Hawthorns hot-seat, admits he has barely had time to give the international football showpiece a second thought.

But he will use every opportunity in eastern Spain, aside from double training sessions, to encourage players to watch the action in Qatar together, as he believes it can prove a healthy learning and bonding experience.

“I promise you that my mind doesn’t have room for these things!” Corberan smiled when asked about the upcoming tournament.

“I don’t even know the order of the games, I know that here in England they have some important games, and I want to use our time in the training camp to watch football games with the players, to have time having dinner and to spend some time watching football.

“Watching football you can learn a lot, but right now, if you asked who plays the first game, I think it’ll be Qatar because they’re the country who have organised it, but this is all I know so far! England play against Wales, and they play USA and Iran. It’ll be a nice game to watch with my players.”

Corberan revealed he was behind the push for a training camp overseas.

“The head coach believes the climate in Spain at this time of year is ideal for multiple training sessions. Corberan is no fan of summer overseas camps as he feels it is too warm.

He explained: “Yes, that is why we made the effort to move (go on a camp), I know the effort of the club too, because this training camp was not planned before.

“But it was one effort the club needed to do, because we needed to have this time together, to break a little bit these weeks, to not be in the same place every single day. At the same time, to come to training more, and then when you train more you need to rest better between the trainings and for me the fact you are concentrated in a hotel, you have the option to train two times per day and to guarantee the recovery of the players.”

Corberan, though, would not pick out a likely winner for the upcoming competition and explained he has been too busy finding his feet as Albion boss to study the squad’s, fixtures and knockout ties.

“Even when you don’t have a game, for example during this week, we had the under-21 game as one game to work,” he added.

“After I was watching Stoke City as they played on Tuesday, so I was watching their game too.

“You arrive at Wednesday and take a lot of information to prepare during the week, as soon as you start to work in football your 100 per cent concentration is in your team.

“Let’s not say 100 per cent, 80 per cent, your 20 per cent is your family and your personal things, but when you are working your mind goes towards the challenge we have in front of us.”