Carlos Corberan not worried by who nets West Brom goals

Albion have struggled to blow teams away this season and most of their victories under Corberan have been slender and reliant on a tight backline.

But with clean sheets having dried up, more onus has been placed on forward areas and striking duo Brandon Thomas-Asante and Daryl Dike have just eight league goals between them this term.

The Baggies, meanwhile, were today tasked with keeping out the Championship’s hottest prospect in front of goal in Middlesbrough’s 20-goal Chuba Akpom. Corberan doesn’t mind his players’ lowly totals, and insists the priority is creating chances.

“The most important thing is to score goals and not concede, if you have one player that can score 20 goals, that is unbelievable,” Corberan said. “If you need to share 20 goals between two players, that is good too.

“If you need three or four, the most important thing is that you find the goals, this is key in football.

“Sometimes we talk about performance and other things but one thing changes football games, goals. Goals change games. You can be working and performing very well but if you don’t score, in the end, the opponent will always have something.

“You can be defending more and then one chance and you can change the game. Goals change the game. They (Middlesbrough) are doing a lot of things, I don’t think their success is down to the goals of one player because they are doing something more collectively that for me is more important than the goals of one player.

“But it is true that the things they are producing collectively, in the end, find a way to score a goal. It is not necessary to have this in teams, it is not important if we score with Swift, like the other day, or with Wallace or Mulumby or Townsend.

“The important thing is to be involved in the box and create chances because the more chances you create, the better chance of scoring a goal.

“For example, the other day Swift has two very similar situations with a cross from the right from Wallace on both, and we couldn’t finish. I don’t mind because the important thing is to arrive there and have the possibility to score.

“To have the possibility for others to score, you have to create things in attack, Middlesbrough is creating things in attack that allow their players to score the goals. In the second half, we create two chances that allow our players to score two goals. The problem for me was that the balance to defend was not the right one and our solidity in defence was not the right one.”