West Brom Fan View: Unexpected FA Cup run provides welcome relief from fear of relegation

West Brom’s defeat at Chelsea on Monday, combined with positive results from their relegation rivals, leaves their Premier League survival hopes hanging by the smallest of threads.

With just 11 league games left, the Baggies find themselves bottom of the table, seven points from safety and five points away from 19th place. I think it’s fair to say that West Brom need to pull off another great escape if they are to retain their Premier League status.

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But this weekend, the club face a welcome break from the pressure of relegation, as they take on Southampton in the fifth-round of the FA Cup. This fixture comes after what was the best result of Alan Pardew’s tenure so far, a brilliant 3-2 win at Liverpool in the previous round.

Whilst it might be easy to look at a fixture like this as an inconvenience at this point in the season, teams who are under pressure to get results quickly need one thing, momentum. Success in this competition could give the players the lift they so dearly need.

After the win at Anfield, it felt like a watershed moment for the team, like something had clicked and the required results in the league would be just around the corner. But the fixtures were such that Albion faced the worst opponent possible straight after such a positive result, Manchester City at The Etihad.

When the inevitable happened, losing comfortably, it seemed to rob the players of the chance to show their new found confidence, and that showed in the home defeat to Southampton a week later.

So surely Alan Pardew’s side have all the right motives to get a win on Saturday. Getting revenge over Southampton and putting in a performance to give their relegation battle a fighting chance.

Come on you Baggies!