West Bromwich Albion didn’t mess around after exiting the Championship play-off semi-final stages, revealing their retained list five days after their 3-1 second-leg defeat to the Saints, with seven senior Baggies players released in the process.
Out of all those chucked to the scrapheap, Matt Phillips’ exit would have stung the most, considering the experienced 33-year-old had accumulated 255 appearances for the Baggies in total across eight memorable seasons, before being greeted with this news after an injury-heavy 2023/24 campaign personally.
Still, the ageing attacker registered 26 appearances when fit for Carlos Corberan‘s men and played his part somewhat – picking up six goal contributions along the way – but will now find he’s a free agent come the end of this month regardless.
This could mean West Brom are in the market for many a winger to fill gaps in the areas down the flanks at the Hawthorns, which is why the promotion nearly-men are looking at this potential capture to soften the blow of the 33-year-old leaving for nothing.
West Brom still in the hunt for “fantastic” forward
Fresh off the back of a “fantastic” season with Oxford United, as it was described by football pundit Carlton Palmer recently, Josh Murphy now has a major decision to make, with his contract situation at the Kassam Stadium unresolved.
The Sun reported back in April that the likes of West Bromwich Albion, Southampton, Queens Park Rangers and more were going after the electric winger’s services, who bagged ten goals from 38 games in total for the U’s on the way to promotion being sealed.
Two of those ten strikes came during his side’s victorious play-off final win over Bolton Wanderers at Wembley, as Murphy’s tricks and flicks down the left wing proved too much for the Trotters to handle on the day, who collapsed on the big stage for Des Buckingham’s men to win 2-0 to pull off a shock promotion.
Still hopeful that their ex-Norwich City man could stay put in Oxfordshire for his side’s exciting voyage up to the Championship, with contract talks currently underway, the Baggies will still have their fingers crossed they can tempt him to relocate to the West Midlands instead, to possess a player in a similar ilk to Phillips again.
Why Murphy would be a strong Phillips replacement
Despite being more of a natural left winger, which is a position that also needs filling in Corberan’s camp with Mikey Johnston returning back to Celtic, Murphy can still be a Phillips replacement in terms of what he offers to West Brom even whilst operating on the left flank.
Both content with twisting and turning defences with slaloming runs when darting forward, as can be seen in the table below, Murphy’s ten goal contributions just in the regular season – all of which came in 2024 – wasn’t far off being eclipsed by Phillips’ six either, despite the soon-to-be free agent playing two games less as a regular absentee to the Hawthorns treatment room.
|
Phillips vs Murphy – head-to-head stats |
||
|---|---|---|
|
Stat – per 90 mins |
||
|
Games played |
26 |
28 |
|
Goals scored |
3 |
6 |
|
Assists |
3 |
4 |
|
Big chances missed |
4 |
6 |
|
Big chances created |
3 |
7 |
|
Successful dribbles |
0.7 |
1.0 |
|
Stats by Sofascore |
||
Bettering Phillips on a number of their comparative attacking statistics, however, Murphy could be viewed as the perfect replacement for Phillips, as well as bolstering the left channel for Corberan’s men, with Johnston also departing meaning the Baggies need a new hero there.
Corberan’s immediate future in the Baggies hot-seat isn’t even secure at the moment though, but they’ll hope he stays put in the dug-out for next season, with Murphy shining brightly potentially for a side who could go one better and win promotion next campaign.
Related
West Brom could seal a “very special” signing to transform Thomas-Asante
West Bromwich Albion will hope Brandon Thomas-Asante is back firing in the goals next season regularly alongside this new recruit.
