Having seemingly seen their automatic promotion hopes slip away with their 2-1 defeat at Huddersfield on Friday night, West Brom were handed a remarkable reprieve on Saturday, as third-placed Brentford suffered a 1-0 defeat at Stoke City.
Those results mean that the Baggies go into their final game of the regular season – away at QPR – still second in the Championship table, one point ahead of the Bees, with the knowledge that they will be promoted with a victory, regardless of what happens in Brentford’s game with Barnsley.
With the prospect of automatic promotion now back in their own hands, plenty of Baggies fans are already thinking about how they want to see that return to the top-flight secured, with the majority of those aspirations centring on one man.
Taking to Twitter in the aftermath of Brentford’s defeat at QPR, one Baggies fan was keen to point out the symmetry of the situation around Chris Brunt, who is set to leave the club at the end of this season.
The suggestion is, that having ended his debut season at West Brom with the club by winning promotion after a final day clash with QPR in 2007/08, the prospect of the Baggies winning promotion against QPR in Brunt’s final campaign with the club feels particularly fitting.
2007:
Chris Brunt joins #WBA. The final game of his first season at the club we played QPR and got promoted.
2020:
Chris Brunt is set to leave #WBA. The final game of his last season at the club is against QPR where Albion could get promoted.
Make it happen @WBA
— Jeremy Peace (parody) (@ChairmanPeace) July 18, 2020
That is an idea that certainly seems to have caught the imagination of plenty of West Brom fans, with many more taking to Twitter to express their desire for Brunt to play a key role in that promotion-decider with West Brom on Wednesday.
Should Chris Brunt start at QPR?YesNo |
Here, we take a look at what some of the Baggies faithful had to say about the possibility of that happening.
And let him score the winning goal from one of his magical free kicks…
— LadyJai 🇺🇦 💙🤍☕ (@BaggieBirdd66) July 18, 2020
🔮 | #WBA
Imagine if Chris Brunt scores the winner against QPR on Wednesday…
It’s written in the stars, folks… ✨
— WBA Report (@WBAReport) July 18, 2020
we win go up,and Chris brunt is in the squad,it’s in the stars boing boing
— Mick (@michsmithso) July 18, 2020
Brunt should start in place of Sawyers in Wednesday, one last hurrah for the great man!
— Michael MacNamee (@mamacnamee_) July 18, 2020
Bilic keeping Chris Brunt as an unused sub to ensure he is of optimum fitness to play the entirity of the final game of the season, scoring the winner and sending the Albion back to the Premier League is now looking quite the masterful decision pic.twitter.com/NCKzbyh5uB
— Heidi (@Heidi_wba) July 18, 2020
If ever there was a stage set for Chris Brunt…
— WBA Rainbow Stand 🅙 (@TheRainbowStand) July 18, 2020
And Chris Brunt has scored the winner to get the Baggies back to the Premier League… #wecandream #wba pic.twitter.com/cT45wqvNRI
— Gemma 💙 (@Gemmabaggies) July 18, 2020