Town boss Kieran McKenna warns that the Blues have as big a task as they could have when they travel to face form side West Bromwich Albion for the second of their season-defining three away games in six days on Saturday (KO 12.30pm, live on Sky Sports Main Event/Football).

The Blues won the first of that trio of matches on the road 2-1 at Charlton on Wednesday having come from behind after conceding in the opening 44 seconds.

That result moved them back ahead of Millwall on goal difference but having played a game fewer than the Lions with the fixture in hand at Southampton — fourth and in FA Cup semi-final action on Saturday — next Tuesday, the third of the away trilogy.

Town will know the result of Millwall’s penultimate game of the season before they kick-off at the Hawthorns with the South Londoners at Leicester, whose second relegation in two seasons was confirmed on Tuesday, on Friday evening.

Following a deduction of two points for breaching Financial Fair Play rules, West Brom are down to 20th in the table but still all but safe from joining the Foxes, six points clear of the drop zone and with a superior goal difference to the two sides below them.

West Brom had looked in danger for most of the season but a storming end to the campaign under interim boss James Morrison, their third manager of 2025/26 following Ryan Mason and McKenna’s one-time Loughborough University colleague Eric Ramsay, had steered them to safety until the EFL sanction.

They are currently on a nine-game unbeaten run, four wins, five draws, and have won their last two, a 2-0 success at Preston last weekend followed by Tuesday’s 3-0 home victory against Watford. They have kept four straight clean sheets and six in their last seven, conceding just twice in that time. 

In a form table based on the last eight matches, only Southampton, 22, have picked up more points than the Midlanders’ tally of 16.

West Brom are unbeaten in their last six at the Hawthorns, winning two, drawing four, since a 2-0 loss to champions Coventry on February 21st.

Overall, their home form is the 14th best in the division, while only seven sides have scored fewer goals on their own turf than their total of 28. However, just seven teams have conceded fewer home goals than the 25 the Baggies have shipped over the course of their Championship campaign.

“I don’t know what the stats are on it but they’re probably the form team in the division at the moment,” McKenna said, speaking after the win at the Valley on Wednesday night.

“They’ve got a strong squad, certainly stronger than their position has been this year, but that can happen in the competitiveness of this division.

“But they seem now to have found a way of playing which suits the players and a settled team and James has done really well going in there and they’re a really, really strong side in good form, getting clean sheets and scoring goals.

“It’s as big a task as we could have and the turnaround is another challenge, but that’s what’s in front of us and it’s up to us to go and find what it’s going to take.”

Town beat the Baggies 1-0 at Portman Road in October during Mason’s time in charge but McKenna says there isn’t too much that can be drawn from that match given the two subsequent changes of manager.

“I don’t think we’ll take loads from it but they’ve not been a bad team all season,” the Blues boss reflected.

“I didn’t see so much of them under Eric, to be honest, but under Ryan they weren’t too far away and I’ve said many times that the margins in this division are so tight and the difference between winning three in a row and losing three in a row isn’t all that big.

“When we played them earlier in the season it was tough and, of course, now with a different level of confidence and a different level of form, it’s going to be even tougher.”

McKenna didn’t believe the Baggies’ season being effectively over - as it was until the points deduction - would have had too much bearing on the game.

“I wouldn’t have thought so,” he added. “I can’t speak for them, but if you ask me what my assumption is, as I say, they’re the form team in the division, they’re playing their last home game, a manager making an impression and making a really good impression, and I’m sure he’ll want to get the post.

“I’m certain we’re going to face a really motivated team, a really good team. Whatever their points or their situation is, it’s going to be a big challenge.”

The match will see Dara O’Shea, Darnell Furlong and Cedric Kipre among others in the Town squad potentially facing their old side, but McKenna doesn’t see that having any impact.

“We’ve signed a lot of players from different Championship clubs, we’ve had that all season with players going back to their old clubs, but a few more with West Brom,” the Northern Irishman continued.

“I don’t think it’s going to have any bearing on the game, to be honest, I’m sure they’ll be fully focused on doing the job for us.”

The Town manager made only two changes at Charlton, one enforced with Leif Davis having felt his hamstring after the Middlesbrough match, and said prior to Wednesday’s game that it’s not the time for rotation for rotation’s sake.

Asked whether there might be similarly few switches of personnel at the Hawthorns or whether the three away games in six days will be too much, McKenna said: “You have to look at it on a case by case basis. Are many of our forward players able to start three away games in five or six days with the outputs that they put in? Let’s see.

“On the other hand, there’s not many of them that do 90 minutes, so that will be factored into it and you’ve got to deal with the game that’s ahead of you and go and try and win the next one. That’s what we’ve done tonight and we’ll take a similar approach to Saturday now.

“That may mean more changes or fewer changes but it’s not like, rotation’s probably the wrong word, certainly at this stage of the season you’re picking a team to win the game, but sometimes the team to win the game is going to have changes and sometimes it’s not.”

McKenna says winger Wes Burns is making progress from the calf injury he suffered in the Sheffield Wednesday match just over a month ago.

“He’s getting closer,” the Blues boss added. “He’s trained over the last couple of days, not with the group, we’ve been here.

“But he’s getting closer now, so we’ll see how he is over the next couple of days. But we’re hopeful he’ll have involvement in the last three games some way or another.”

The Team

McKenna will probably make a few more changes than at the Valley, mainly in attacking areas.

Christian Walton will be in goal with Furlong at right-back and skipper Dara O’Shea and Jacob Greaves the centre-halves.

Davis missed the trip to the Valley but his hamstring injury wasn’t considered serious, so the former Leeds man may return at left-back. If not, Ben Johnson will keep his place.

Azor Matusiwa will continue in central midfield with Dan Neil perhaps coming in for Jack Taylor alongside him.

Ahead of them, McKenna could look to freshen things up with Sindre Walle Egeli, Marcelino Nunez and Jack Clarke perhaps coming back into the XI, and George Hirst starting as the central striker.

The Opposition

Albion are expected to be at full strength with only skipper Jed Wallace sidelined at present.

“We can enjoy Saturday,” interim-boss Morrison told the Express & Star. “But I want to go and test ourselves against a top team.”

History

Historically, Town have won 34 games between the sides (31 in the league), West Brom 24 (23) with 17 (15) ending in draws.

The Blues are without a win in seven at the Hawthorns since a 1-0 success under George Burley in March 1999, Manu Thetis scoring the only goal with an overhead kick before being sent off in the closing stages.

In October, Jack Clarke’s fifth goal of the season saw Town to a 1-0 victory over West Brom at Portman Road.

The Blues were the better side throughout but had to wait until the 83rd minute for a goal, sub Clarke following up after an Ivan Azon effort had been saved, Jens Cajuste having forced an error as the Baggies passed out of their area.

The teams last met at the Hawthorns in November 2023 when Town fell to only their second Championship defeat of that season and first away from home in the league in 10 months as goals at the start of each half from now-Blues right-back Furlong and Grady Diangana saw West Brom to a 2-0 victory in Town manager McKenna’s 100th game in charge of the club.

Furlong’s flicked header from a corner gave the Baggies the lead in the fifth minute, then Diangana added the second two minutes after the break with the Blues subsequently never looking like taking anything from the game.

Familiar Faces

Furlong signed for the Blues last summer from West Brom for £3.5 million after six years at the Hawthorns during which time he made 227 starts and 20 sub appearances, scoring 11 goals.

Blues skipper O’Shea joined the Baggies’ academy at 16 in 2015 and went on to make 98 starts and nine sub appearances, scoring seven times before leaving for Burnley in the summer of 2023.

Cedric Kipre, who is on loan with the Blues from Reims for the season, was with West Brom from September 2020 until the summer of 2024 when he joined the Ligue 2 club having made 65 starts and three sub appearances, scoring four times. In 2023/24 the central defender was named the club’s Player of the Season.

Town have two former Baggies keepers, Alex Palmer and David Button. Palmer came through the academy ranks at the Hawthorns and after 11 years at the club, following a number of loan spells, made his senior West Brom debut in August 2021. He went on to make 104 starts before joining the Blues in January 2025.

Button, who signed for Town last summer after leaving Reading, was with the Midlanders from 2020 until 2023, making 31 starts.

The Blues’ sixth ex-West Brom player is Conor Townsend, who is out for the season with an ACL injury. The left-back joined Town from the Baggies in the summer of 2024 having made 190 starts and 25 sub appearances, scoring four goals, in six years.

Blues chairman and CEO Mark Ashton was born and bred in West Bromwich and grew up supporting the club. He was a youth goalkeeper with Albion - playing under Town legend Brian Talbot - and subsequently held various community and coaching roles before switching to the business side of the club, eventually joining the board under ex-Town chairman Mike O'Leary.

Blues assistant manager Martyn Pert had a spell at West Brom on Aidy Boothroyd’s staff early in his coaching career.

The Officials

Saturday’s referee is Matt Donohue, his assistants Andrew Fox and Mark Dwyer, and the fourth official Dean Whitestone.

Donohue has shown 121 yellow cards and three red in 29 games so far this season.

The Manchester-based official has refereed three Blues matches already this season, most recently the 2-1 defeat at Oxford in November when he kept his cards in his pocket throughout.

He also took control of the 2-1 loss at Middlesbrough the previous month in which he gave Town a penalty, which Hirst saw saved after Davis had been hauled over, and cautioned Matusiwa and three Teessiders.

In August, he was in the middle for the 1-0 defeat at Preston in which he awarded the Lilywhites the spot-kick which won the game in the 11th minute for an apparent Greaves foul on Milutin Osmajic, who scored, which was disputed at length by the Town players. Donohue also yellow-carded Johnson, Kasey McAteer and six home players.

Prior to this campaign, Donohue had taken charge of four previous Town games, the most recent the 1-0 defeat to Norwich at Carrow Road in April 2024 when he booked only Axel Tuanzebe.

Three months earlier, he was the man in the middle for the 3-1 FA Cup victory at AFC Wimbledon in which he red-carded Wombles midfielder Harry Pell for a second bookable offence and also cautioned Tuanzebe, George Edmundson, Marcus Harness and one other Dons player.

He was also in charge of the 3-0 home victory over Hull City in October 2023 in which he - unusually judging by his overall stats - kept his cards in his pocket throughout.

Prior to that, Donohue refereed the 1-1 draw at Morecambe in February 2022 in which he booked only Macauley Bonne and Tyreeq Bakinson.

Squad From

Walton, Palmer, Button, Furlong, Davis, Johnson, O’Shea (c), Kipre, Greaves, Baggott, Matusiwa, Cajuste, Neil, Taylor, Clarke, Philogene, Nunez, Burns, Walle Egeli, McAteer, Mehmeti, Akpom, Hirst, Azon.

Photo: TWTD