West Bromwich Albion 2-0 Preston North End: Okay Yokuslu double ignites resurgent Baggies

Turkish midfielder Okay Yokuslu had scored once in 21 appearances this season before his brace against Preston

West Brom moved within a point of the Championship play-off spots as they brushed aside out-of-sorts Preston at The Hawthorns.

North End goalkeeper Freddie Woodman made a string of fine saves before he was beaten by Okay Yokuslu’s powerful 20-yard drive which found the bottom corner.

John Swift crashed a long-range shot against the bar within two minutes of coming on as a second-half substitute as the hosts continued to threaten.

Swift then pounced when Preston coughed up possession outside their own box and played in Yokuslu, who fired in his second to wrap up Albion’s seventh win in eight matches.

Baggies boss Carlos Corberan now has seven wins and six clean sheets from nine matches since replacing Steve Bruce in October, a run which has lifted Albion from second-bottom to ninth.

The resurgent Baggies, roared on to a fourth successive home win by a sold-out Hawthorns, gradually came to dominate the first half, with only the woodwork and an outstanding Woodman keeping them at bay.

Jed Wallace cut into the box and guided a shot across Woodman against the far post, and moments later forced the Preston keeper into an acrobatic save at full stretch with a curling long-range effort.

Woodman then stuck out a right hand to somehow claw away Brandon Thomas-Asante’s powerful close-range strike before pulling off a double save from Wallace’s deflected effort and Thomas-Asante’s follow-up.

The dam finally burst when Yokuslu beat the 25-year-old with a smart finish, and by the time the Turkish midfielder doubled the lead with half-an-hour left, the Baggies looked certain winners.

Preston, who arrived with the Championship’s second-best away record, with 21 points from 11 outings, almost pulled one back when Alistair McCann’s flick came back off the post, but they ended up well beaten.

West Bromwich Albion head coach Carlos Corberan told BBC Radio WM:

“The team played really well from the first minute until the 80th minute.

“The last 10 minutes we didn’t control the game enough. We allowed them to take some free-kicks and set-pieces, which we had stopped for all of the first 80 minutes, but the performance of the team in attack and defence was superb.

“It’s obviously positive when the opponents’ goalkeeper is the best player because it means the team was creating many things.”

Preston North End boss Ryan Lowe told BBC Radio Lancashire:

“They were very good but, in terms of them being very good, we weren’t quite at it with the ball or without the ball.

“We had a spell in the first half where we were moving the ball side to side and were creating moments and getting the ball in their final third, and in the second half we came out and had a little rally. But you can’t give a team like that, who are in form, two golden opportunities, which we did.

“We knew it was going to be a tough evening because of the form they’re in, but we wanted to be positive and believe we could get something out of it. Ultimately that wasn’t the case because we gifted them two goals.”

Line-ups West Brom

Formation 4-2-3-1

24Palmer

2Furlong4O’Shea15Pieters3Townsend

14Molumby35Yokuslu

17J Wallace7Rogic11Diangana

21Thomas-Asante

Substitutes

Preston

Formation 3-5-2

1Woodman

14Storey5Bauer6Lindsay

44Potts18Ledson8Browne4Whiteman2Fernández

9Evans19Riis

Substitutes

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