Albion Analysis: Hyypia needs help in January transfer window

Albion chairman Tony Bloom does not like trading in the January transfer window.

He believes it is harder to find the right players and get value for money but he has still been prepared to do business in the past in the New Year.

Bloom is going to have to show willing again to help Sami Hyypia haul Albion out of their precarious position just outside the Championship relegation zone.

The Seagulls have a tough-looking programme of seven games before the January window opens, including trips to Norwich, Derby and Wolves and facing improving Fulham twice.

It is hard to see them being in a much more comfortable spot than they are now seven weeks down the line.

The results tell the story. The draw against Blackburn was the seventh in the last ten league games, so they are not that bad.

Only one of the last 13 has ended in victory, against Wigan who are now in the drop zone, so they are not very good either. Nowhere near good enough to challenge for the top six for the third season in succession.

A mid-table finish under Hyypia in his first season, after so many changes to the squad, would not be the end of the world. The worry is Albion will struggle to achieve that unless they add more quality.

Elliott Bennett has made a difference in his two games back at the club on the right flank. He was inspirational against Wigan last week and I agreed, for once, with the sponsors who named him man-of-the-match against Rovers.

He faded as an attacking threat in the second half, when Blackburn were the better side and he had to concentrate more on defensive duties.

In the opening 45 minutes his use of possession, whether crossing, passing or delivering set pieces, was head and shoulders above the rest.

Namesake Joe ran him close. The left-back on loan from Aston Villa has benefited, like Inigo Calderon on the other side of the pitch in the absence of the injured Bruno, from the return to more natural width in front of them in Bennett and Kazenga LuaLua.

The tactical tinkering by Hyypia, full-backs operating less like wingbacks, has given the team more of a solid feel, which is a good starting point when you are in trouble.

The trouble is Bennett, the E version, cannot play against his parent club Norwich and they may well, considering their suspect form, want him back once his loan ends with Fulham's visit a week later.

It smacks of sticking plasters over gaping wounds. The bleeding of not adequately replacing the departed goes back some way, further even than the previous January window when Ashley Barnes, a topical Premier League matchwinner for Burnley, was among those who left.

Hyypia spoke tellingly in his post-match press conference of the difficulties he has confronted ever since his appointment deep into the close season, initially in reference to the flood of loan signings.

He said: "Of course it makes it harder. One thing which made it harder from the beginning as well is that we didn't have a lot of time to work on the new signings, because I like all the time to know more and more background information about them.

"Their attitude and mentality, those kind of things are very important for me. Sometimes with loan signings you try to ask people who know how they are and you have to trust what people say to you.

"In the summer it was a little bit of the same thing, that I was depending on information people gave me. That made it more difficult in the summer to do the signings as well."

At half-time Albion were on course for back-to-back wins. Gary Gardner scored against Wigan and they held on, Gardner scored again approaching the break.

The midfielder borrowed from Villa found the bottom corner with a swivelling shot when the ball reached him through a crowd of players from Jake Forster-Caskey's corner.

The number of goals Albion have scored from set pieces is one aspect which has improved considerably under Hyyppia's command.

The lead, not for the first time, was shortlived, spanning nine minutes either side of the interval. Rudy Gestede, Rovers' 6ft 4ins target man, moved into double figures for the campaign.

His looping header 12 yards out from Markus Olsson's left-wing cross span over the line via the upright. Christian Walton, retained in goal at Ali Al-Habsi's expense to solve Hyypia's headache of being allowed to name only five of his six loanees, is just as tall but Gestede's precision defied the teenager's full-length dive.

Gestede's tally is yet another reminder that the paucity of goals from Albion's strikers, who did not include Craig Mackail-Smith on the bench because of illness, remains acute.

Sam Baldock worked hard against Blackburn's sturdy centre-halves but should have done better with the one chance he had to score his first home goal, a tame first half shot from Elliott Bennett's through ball.

Hyypia's assessment that Albion deserved more was optimistic. It was a moderate contest and a draw was the fair outcome.

Blackburn, who benched the prolific Jordan Rhodes in favour of a five-man midfield, were strong, direct but generally disappointing considering their position on the edge of the play-off places.

How Hyypia must wish for such comfort heading into the third and final international break. He said: "The biggest problem has been that we haven't been effective in front of the opposition goal and the opposition have been in effective in front of our goal.

"We have talked about those kind of things. We have to concentrate more, scoring more from our chances and try to defend a little better to not give chances to the opposition. When we solve that problem at both ends it will be good."

Ineffective in both boxes is a damaging combination, as is an inability to sustain a performance for 90 minutes, particularly at the Amex, although Hyypia pointed out Albion were pretty good throughout in defeat at Bournemouth. He could also have mentioned Cardiff at home.

He will be fretting now that Gordon Greer with Scotland and the almost fit-again Aaron Hughes with Northern Ireland return from international duty unscathed. Lewis Dunk is banned from the centre of defence at Norwich for the fifth booking he received for a rash first half tackle.

Albion are still a long, long way from resolving their shortcomings in the post-Ulloa period at the other end of the pitch. Time is running out before the loan window ends, so Hyypia will probably have to wait for a potentially crucial January for his wish for more firepower.