Bristol City vs West Bromwich Albion. Sky Bet Championship.
Ashton GateAttendance24,022.
Report and highlights from the Sky Bet Championship clash at Ashton Gate
Saturday 22 February 2020 18:46, UK
Championship leaders West Brom cruised to a comprehensive 3-0 win at play-off hopefuls Bristol City despite Romaine Sawyers' late red card.
Slaven Bilic's team took the lead in the 32nd minute when Callum Robinson was left unmarked in City's box and, although the advancing Daniel Bentley saved his initial shot, the ball rebounded off his face to beat the goalkeeper.
Four minutes later, Bentley was at fault when he spilled a shot from Jake Livermore that he should have held and Hal Robson-Kanu was on hand to prod home from close range.
The game erupted after 75 minutes when Sawyers reacted angrily to being fouled by Jamie Paterson and appeared to grab the City substitute by the throat. After consulting an assistant, referee Darren England issued a straight red card.
Bilic remonstrated angrily at the decision but seconds later saw a weak header from Ashley Williams towards Bentley pounced upon by Robson-Kanu, who volleyed in his second to spark wild celebrations in the Albion dugout.
The visitors were well worth their interval lead, but City were left to rue costly errors for both goals.
Markus Henriksen gave the ball away in a dangerous position to leave his defence in trouble for the first and Famara Diedhiou was caught in possession trying to dribble out of defence for the second.
The visitors looked by far the more dangerous team in a sharp first-half display. Matheus Pereira saw a sweetly-struck volley blocked by Jack Hunt, while Williams halted a dangerous Robson-Kanu raid with a superbly-timed tackle.
Livermore found plenty of space to fire at goal, sending a low shot just wide from 25 yards after 34 minutes and having another effort beaten away by Bentley moments later.
And West Brom made their pressure count as Robinson and Robson-Kanu fired the visitors into a deserved 2-0 lead after two quickfire goals.
City barely threatened until the 44th minute when a Nahki Wells cross just eluded Callum O'Dowda as it flashed across goal.
The second half began with Albion again in the ascendancy, with Robson-Kanu volleying narrowly wide from 20 yards and Filip Krovinovic firing over after a powerful run.
Robson-Kanu should have made it 3-0 in the 62nd minute when breaking clear, only to shoot wide under a challenge from Benkovic.
City were being outmuscled in all areas of the pitch and head coach Lee Johnson responded by sending on Andreas Weimann and Paterson for wingers Callum O'Dowda and Niclas Eliasson.
Wells was off target with two free-kicks from distance but the hosts were creating nothing from open play.
In contrast, Albion had another great chance when Robinson exchanged passes with Robson-Kanu and had his shot parried by Bentley.
Weimann volleyed over from a Jay Dasilva cross for the hosts before Sawyers was dismissed for his reaction to Paterson's challenge.
However, the numerical disadvantage did not matter as Robson-Kanu capitalised on Williams' slack header to wrap up victory.
Bristol City's Lee Johnson: "Slaven is wrong if he attributes the sending-off to our reaction. If someone put his hands around one of my player's throats, of course I am going to be angry. It was a clear red card. All I did was to draw the fourth official's attention to what had happened and amazingly he hadn't seen anything.
"My only complaints are with my own team. For 15 minutes it was a game and then we made so many errors against a good side that we couldn't expect to win. There was an error for the first goal, two for the second and a howler for the third.
"They had that bit more physical strength in key areas and that comes from the sort of signings you can make with parachute payments. We had to be right on our game and it didn't happen. But we will go again and keep fighting to get in those play-off places."
West Brom's Slaven Bilic: "There was no problem and I shook hands with Lee. If you ask me if I liked his reaction to the incident involving Romaine, I would say no, but maybe in his position I would have done the same. I sympathised with Romaine because he is not the sort of player to earn a ban for being too aggressive.
"If that was a red card, we have going to have so many. It was the reaction of their bench that brought about the sending-off, but we are not Dalai Lamas in football so I understand it.
It had to rank as one of our most complete performances of the season. To come here and win 3-0 against opponents in their position was fantastic and we managed the game so well. The lads looked sharp and determined in training this week so I just told them to go out and play the same way."
