West Brom had a nightmare with James Chester transfer | OneFootball

West Brom have seen many players come and go from the club over the past few years on loan spells and permanent deals.

As happens with many teams, some transfers don’t always go according to plan in terms of what happens when they arrive at the club.

One example of a transfer that falls into this category for the Midlands club is their move for defender James Chester back in the 2015 summer window from Hull City for a fee of £8m.

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Throughout the 2015/16 season, the Welshman, who was reportedly picking up a weekly wage of £33k-per-week at the Hawthorns, made just 19 appearances across all competitions for the Baggies under Tony Pulis, starting just 14 of them.

Despite predominantly being a centre-back, the 33-year-old only played in his natural position on two occasions, finding himself being deployed on the left and right full-back positions more often than not.

In the 13 league appearances he made in a West Brom shirt, the defender managed to rack up five yellow cards and a rather uninspiring overall performance rating of 6.71 from WhoScored.

With just one season and 54 weeks as a Baggies player to his name, the club moved him on to their Midlands rivals Aston Villa in August 2016 before he then joined Stoke City in 2020, meaning that West Brom wasted a total sum of £9.7m on his transfer fee and weekly wages.

Did West Brom make a mistake signing James Chester?

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Taking all of this into account, it’s safe to say that the club wasted their time and a substantial amount of money on bringing Chester to the Hawthorns, who has since described his time there as “frustrating” due to his lack of regular game time.

Looking back over his disappointing stint with the Baggies, it begs the question of whether things would have been different had he have been given a consistent run in the team playing in his natural position rather than as a full-back every now and again.

Either way, it’s hard to see the defender as anything other than a rather underwhelming signing from the club, who would have been better off saving their money or using it more wisely on a player better suited for what they needed at the time.