Steve Clarke wants West Brom to 'attack' Capital One Cup

 

West Brom boss Steve Clarke is promising to "attack" the Capital One Cup competition.

Clarke has made a fine start as Baggies head coach and sees no reason why the club should not be targeting silverware via the competition.

West Brom begin their challenge at League One leaders Yeovil and Clarke, who won the cup as a member of Liverpool's backroom staff last season, expects his players to be ready for the occasion.

Clarke told the club's website, wba.co.uk: "It's their cup final. We're the Premier League big boys and we're going down there, they're hoping to cause a cup upset.

"All I'll say to our players is our ambition to win the League Cup has to be bigger than Yeovil's ambition to do well in one game against us.

"It is a competition that is open. We will go down there and be red-hot favourites - and so we should be - but we need to match the attitude at Yeovil.

"We need to be professional. We'll go down there, we'll try to get ourselves into the next round and we will attack the competition."

As well as last season's success with Liverpool, Clarke has a strong affinity with the competition from his time at Chelsea.

The Scot earned a winners' medal as a player in 1998 and enjoyed two more successes working as a coach under Jose Mourinho.

He said: "It is a cup that has been good to me. I won it as a player, I've won it as a coach. It is a competition I enjoy.

"It is good in the early part of the season because there are a lot of games for the players in the squad, as there are lot of players in the squad that deserve to play that maybe don't get the chance.

"You can use it wisely that way. As long as everyone goes with the right attitude you can progress and that is what cup competitions are all about."

Clarke's side will travel with confidence after beating Liverpool and drawing with Tottenham in their opening two Barclays Premier League games under his charge.

Clarke might be tempted to give a first start to new striker Markus Rosenberg, who made his debut off the bench against Spurs.

PA

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