Wolves head to the capital, Baggies could rue missed chances, Villa set to be stretched & Blues seeing improvements: West Midlands football roundup

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The four West Midlands clubs are all in action this weekend, as Charlie Haffenden dissects the latest talking points from them all ahead of the matches.

Transcript

00:00 Wolves are once again in the capital this weekend as they take on league leaders Arsenal.

00:07 What can we expect from the game?

00:09 I think this one is tricky obviously with Arsenal topping the league now. At home Wolves

00:16 are very good though beating these top sides, it's just away from, they struggle a bit no

00:21 matter who they play against. This one is at the Emirates so I think O'Neill's team

00:25 maybe got that against them but they are playing better against the sides in the top half.

00:29 It's better when teams come at Wolves, they get to play out a little bit more and utilise

00:35 a transition so I think they'll actually be better in that game than they were against

00:38 Fulham. They look decent against Fulham, don't get me wrong, but the fair result probably

00:42 being a draw or a win for Fulham.

00:44 West Brom may be third but can we expect a dip in form if they do not start to convert

00:49 more of their chances?

00:51 I think so yeah because they've got such a tough run of fixtures as well. It might be

00:54 bold of me to say they're in third at the moment but it is so tight, it's just four

00:59 points to Preston in seventh, a couple of defeats to West Brom and they're right back

01:03 out of it again and they have got those tough games coming up. I think we've got Leicester

01:08 at the weekend, Sunderland to play as well, Middlesbrough, Stoke, Norwich, Leeds all in

01:12 the next seven. Rotherham in there as well, they should be able to win against them but

01:16 I believe away from them. So yeah it is a tricky run and I think it will tell a lot

01:22 actually what these results are in this. If they can come out of it relatively unscathed

01:26 though and they're still in third, fourth, fifth place then I think they've got a very

01:30 good chance because the fixtures after that are very good.

01:33 With fixtures bounting up for Aston Villa, will their squad be able to cope and maintain

01:38 their high standards?

01:39 They've been very consistent actually. They do seem to rotate a little bit and they've

01:43 got that squad depth to be able to do that. Newcastle we've seen recently of their injuries

01:47 they simply can't do that. Brighton as well in a very similar situation. Villa have got

01:52 a few problems but not as much for quantity. It's more just the severity and the key players

01:56 that they're missing. So the fact they've still got a fair amount of quantity there

02:00 means they can utilise the rotation and it has worked for them. There is the occasional

02:05 lapse of results and the concentration. Everton in the Carabao Cup, Nottingham Forest away

02:10 from home, Walsall away as well in the first game in the European group stages. They've

02:15 got Walsall again this time around.

02:18 Have Birmingham City seen improved performances under Wayne Rooney since he was appointed?

02:23 Yes, I think there's definitely been an improvement at the start. You couldn't get much worse.

02:28 It was just Gunn-Ho having two centre-backs and putting the full-backs so high up the

02:33 pitch you almost formed a front five. And then one of the centre-halves that was back,

02:38 one of the two, would step up into midfield. So you're left with just Kevin Long at the

02:41 back who's got no pace whatsoever and they were just so open. Now they've gone a little

02:46 bit less Gunn-Ho. They've got one full-back going forward at a time and the centre-backs

02:50 staying back a bit more. Bielik stepping in as maybe a third centre-half at times as well

02:54 from midfield.

02:55 Plenty discussed from the West Midlands this week. It now remains to be seen what the weekend's

03:00 matches will bring for the teams.

03:03 [BLANK_AUDIO]

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