Hodgson rues loss of leaders

by Setanta Staff , 26 January 2012 football news

Head coach Roy Hodgson admits West Brom have missed the "leadership qualities" of Chris Brunt, Zoltan Gera and Jonas Olsson.


Skipper Brunt and playmaker Gera are facing lengthy injury lay-offs while central defender Olsson only returned to the side for Saturday's win at Stoke after three weeks out.

The Baggies had lost all three Barclays Premier League games during Olsson's absence.

Hodgson said: "Statistics can be used to prove a lot of things but what Jonas brings to the team when he's playing, as did Chris Brunt and Zoltan Gera, are leadership qualities.

"Jonas takes a game by the scruff of the net, takes other people with him, leads by example.

"When he's not playing, we sometimes miss that type of leadership, desire and will to win that rubs off on others.

"I don't know quite what the ratio is in terms of wins and defeats when you take those players out of it. But three of the games Jonas has not played in have been recent defeats."

Watch GAA games live on PPV
Pos
Team P W D L +/- PTS
1.
Man City
38
28
5
5
64
89
2.
Man Utd
38
28
5
5
56
89
3.
Arsenal
38
21
7
10
25
70
4.
Tottenham
38
20
9
9
25
69
5.
Newcastle
38
19
8
11
5
65
6.
Chelsea
38
18
10
10
19
64
7.
Everton
38
15
11
12
10
56
8.
Liverpool
38
14
10
14
7
52
9.
Fulham
38
14
10
14
-3
52
10.
West Brom
38
13
8
17
-7
47
11.
Swansea
38
12
11
15
-7
47
12.
Norwich
38
12
11
15
-14
47
13.
Sunderland
38
11
12
15
-1
45
14.
Stoke
38
11
12
15
-17
45
15.
Wigan
38
11
10
17
-20
43
16.
Aston Villa
38
7
17
14
-16
38
17.
QPR
38
10
7
21
-23
37
18.
Bolton
38
10
6
22
-31
36
19.
Blackburn
38
8
7
23
-30
31
20.
Wolverhampton
38
5
10
23
-43
25
Watch Online
Edit Web Part Contents