Brandon Thomas-Asante brushes off Leeds United 'fortune' suggestion but hails Whites feature

Friday night’s Championship contest ended in a 1-1 draw after Thomas-Asante’s 52nd-minute opener was eventually cancelled out by a Luke Ayling header with 18 minutes left. The Baggies netted with just their second attempt at goal as a Jayson Molumby strike from a corner deflected off Thomas-Asante into the back of the net but Thomas-Asante’s contact was made with his arm.

Referee Matthew Donohue and his team were unable to see that Thomas-Asante had effectively netted through a handball and the absence of VAR for EFL fixtures meant that the goal was allowed to stand. Molumby initially whirled away to celebrate before Thomas-Asante took centre stage and the Baggies striker has given short shrift to the suggestion of the luck involved in giving his side the lead.

Speaking to WBA TV, Thomas-Asante was asked if that was the most innocuous goal he had ever scored and reasoned: "To be fair, there's been a few, I'm not going to lie. But however it goes in, as long as it can obviously help the team and obviously add to the tally, I’ll take it, however it comes."

Pressed on the large slice of fortune involved in where the ball hit his body, the striker reasoned: "There's been a few times along the way where it hits off any body part sort of thing. And then I sort of ran. I thought that everyone knew it was mine and then I turned around he (Molumby) was running off celebrating, arms out and whatnot so I thought I had to add a little bit more sauce to the celebration for a second."

West Brom were unable to muster a single attempt at goal in the first half during which Leeds had six attempts and the theme largely continued after the break. Leeds finished the contest having had 16 attempts at goal compared to West Brom’s four but the Baggies were only denied an opener shortly before Thomas-Asante’s strike via a fantastic Illan Meslier save.

Thomas-Asante felt a draw was a fair outcome and praised the quality within the Whites side.

“It was a well-fought point,” said the 24-year-old forward.

"There were times in the game and sometimes it’s a hard one because there was a lot of possession that Leeds had and we knew what they would bring, being away from home for us and obviously the quality of the opponent that we had.

"But saying that, I think when we did manage to spring out, we caused problems at times and I think, on the whole, we’ll probably take the point to be fair. We’re always ambitious, we don’t go in the games to draw. But coming out of it, knowing how the game went, we’ll take that and hopefully it pays off by the end of this season."