West Ham must shoulder the blame for Callum Marshall failing in his loan move at West Brom.
The Northern Ireland international was left out of the Albion squad altogether for their game against Millwall on Friday (29 March).
That makes it the seventh game in a row where the 19-year-old hasn’t made an appearance for the Baggies since making his loan move to the Championship club in the January transfer window.
The forward played in three out of his first four games at The Hawthorns, coming off the bench as a substitute in each of those outings.
But he clearly didn’t do enough to show Carlos Corberan that he deserves more opportunities in the side and now he’s deemed him to not even be worth a place on the bench.
There will probably be some debate about who is to blame in this situation.
Should West Ham have chosen a loan move more wisely for the teenager? Should West Brom have been more open about the role he would play?
Maybe there is an argument both ways, but the fact of the matter is, he’s our player and it’s up to us to act in his best interests.
While I’m sure Corberan did intend to play him more when he sanctioned the deal, he would have just been looking to beef up his squad to aid their promotion bid.
Sometimes clubs bring in loanees to add competition for their first-team players and that could have happened in this instance.
With the Baggies currently flying in the second tier, it was always going to be difficult for an up-and-coming talent to break into the side ahead of some experienced players.
West Ham should have picked Callum Marshall loan move better
Marshall is no doubt a superb talent and there are other clubs who would love to have him.
He scored an impressive 16 goals in 10 Premier League 2 appearances before he left in January and that no doubt would have caught the eye of several interested onlookers.
We really should have taken some time over the decision and secured him a loan move where he’d be guaranteed minutes.
Someone in mid-table in the Championship or even a side battling relegation would have offered him more opportunities.
But when Premier League football is on the line, West Brom was never a good move.
It will be quite a strange feeling for the forward to have gone from being away on international duty over the past 10 days or so to not being involved at all against Millwall.
When Marshall returns to the London Stadium in the summer, we seriously need to put some thought into where he can go out on loan to further his development next season.
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