Carlos Corberan has reasoned that he hasn’t any interest in receiving individual accolades in a team sport sphere after the West Bromwich Albion boss was surprisingly ignored in the Championship’s manager of the year nominations. The end-of-season EFL awards celebrate the best performances of coach, player, young player, supporter and club, among other gongs.
For the Championship manager of the year, there are three individuals in the running – those names are Daniel Farke of Leeds United, Kieran McKenna of double-promotion-chasing Ipswich Town and Hull City’s Liam Rosenior. While you can make cases for a host of coaches around the division, including Enzo Maresca and Marti Cifuentes, Corberan is certainly among those who might consider themselves unfortunate to have missed out on recognition.
Corberan has led Albion to fifth in what is his first full season at the club; having lifted them away from relegation peril last winter, the Baggies fell just short in their efforts to complete a staggering rise up the table from the bottom three to the top six. After a pre-season of work under Corberan, and despite being only able to add players on free transfers and loan deals, Albion’s fortunes have been transformed. Enough to justify a nomination then, surely?
Not so for the Spaniard himself, who remains ultra focused on ensuring that Albion earn themselves a shot of promotion through the play-offs by cementing their place in the top six in these final half dozen matches – they begin with the short trip to Stoke City in the Potteries on Saturday. For Corberan, football is a team sport, where targets can’t be achieved by a single person.
“Football is a collective sport, I don’t believe or don’t have interest in individual awards for players or coaches,” he said. “Football is collective and my only focus is on helping this club in the best way I can to put it in the best position.
“Thanks to the work of my players we arrive in the last moment of the season with a possibility to fight for a play off position. We have many games to play and this possibility is the only thing that is important to me.”
Albion remain unbeaten in their last eight matches and they’ve lost just once, that being to the side who sit above them Southampton, since defeat to Wolves in the FA Cup back in January. By drawing with Watford on Easter Monday, they extended their advantage to the chasing pack below, for Norwich, Coventry, Hull and Preston were all beaten.
“I think we need to be competing in the best way in every single game, because we want to add points,” Corberan added. “Our mind is on adding points to see what we can do to help us in the pitch and help us get closer to the end result we want to achieve.
“Everyone wants to win games and we need to do the necessary behaviours to help us, the focus is not on the result but being focused to perform well, defending well, attack well, and that is something we need right now.”
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Isaac Isaac 
AONDONA BARTHELOMEW 
abe Aondoyila