It’s always difficult at St Mary’s, says Pulis

Pulis says he watched Saints’ defeat to Tottenham on Wednesday night and feels the hosts will be keen to put things right as quickly as they can against his side.

The Baggies boss also praised the work being done behind the scenes at St Mary’s, and added his respect for opposite number, Claude Puel.

“He’s done well,” said Pulis. “He’s got a good record in management in France so he knows the game, he knows the job and it will be a tough, tough game.

“It’s always difficult going down to St Mary’s and they’ll be smarting a little bit from the other night. I don’t think they deserved to lose that game the way they did and by the number of goals so they’ll be smarting and we understand that. It will be a tough game for us.

“They’ve done remarkably well in their recruitment. Whether it’s players coming through or the players that they’ve signed, their recruitment department deserves a hell of a lot of credit because they’ve moved the managers as well and there doesn’t seem to be any change in the way they move and the way they go forward.

“Les Reed has been involved in most of the stuff that’s gone on over there with the changeover of managers and he seems to have kept everything very stable, and everybody at that football club looks as though they are pointed in one direction, and everybody follows that direction.”

EVERYBODY AT THAT FOOTBALL CLUB LOOKS AS THOUGH THEY ARE POINTED IN ONE DIRECTION, AND EVERYBODY FOLLOWS THAT DIRECTION.

TONY PULIS
WEST BROMWICH ALBION MANAGER

On his own team, Pulis says he’ll have some decisions to make on the starting eleven he puts out at St Mary’s as they also prepare to host Hull City early next week.

“We’ve got one or two knocks which we’ll look at and then we’ve got two games in three days so we might make one or two changes to keep a few people fresh for the game on Tuesday,” he explained. “If they’ve got knocks we won’t take any chances.

“We’ve had a real tough run of games and that continues with the Southampton game away from home and then after the Hull game we’ve got coming up is Tottenham. It’s a real difficult period for us in respect of the quality of teams we’re playing against.

“There’s such fine margins between winning and losing in the Premier League and everybody has to stay on the front foot everywhere, from the terraces and from the club.”