Roy Hodgson moves to calm West Brom expectations
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Your support makes all the difference.Roy Hodgson has played down expectation levels for the new season after admitting West Brom are operating on a tight financial budget compared to many clubs.
The Baggies have brought in six players this summer in Gareth McAuley, Billy Jones, Zoltan Gera, Ben Foster, Martin Fulop and Shane Long.
But Long was the only player to cost a sizeable fee - an initial £4.5million - with the others all Bosman free signings apart from Foster, who has joined on loan from Birmingham.
Albion finished 11th in the Barclays Premier League last season after collecting 20 points from the final 12 games.
But Hodgson said: "People need to be sufficiently aware to realise we are still fighting with lesser resources and we are still pulling rabbits out of the hat to some extent.
"If you spend £100million you are likely to get more or better players than the team that spends £2-3million.
"If you want a Savile Row suit, you pay Saville Row prices but you can still put a suit on your back from Tesco's.
"There are limits and it would be unfair to expect the Tesco man to look as good as the Savile Row man."
Hodgson added: "We are not Manchester City or Liverpool. People talk about spending £50million as if it is nothing at all.
"We talk about net spends of £2-3million if we're lucky. You have to put those things into perspective - and I think our fans can.
"I'd like to think they have got as realistic an attitude towards things as we have."
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