West Brom dodged £10m transfer bullet - it hit Southampton FC instead | OneFootball

West Bromwich Albion dodged a Mislav Orsic bullet that eventually hit Southampton.

West Bromwich Albion, like a lot of EFL clubs, have endured their fair share of transfer mistakes over the last decade or so – and some have cost them big money, but there is one that they managed to avoid in January 2020.

In the 2019/20 campaign, West Brom, under the management of Slaven Bilic, gained automatic promotion back to the Premier League, finishing as runners’ up to Leeds United in the Championship.

The Bilic-coached Baggies had been at the top-of-the-table for much of the campaign before a dip in the late winter and early spring saw them wobble ever so slightly.

The summer of 2019 had seen them bring in some real gems, especially on loan, with the signings of Filip Krovinovic, Grady Diangana and Matheus Pereira from Benfica, West Ham United and Sporting CP, respectively.

The winter window saw them seek to add, too, and they did manage to get permanent deals for Lee Peltier and Kamil Grosicki over the line, as well as an initial loan deal for Callum Robinson.

However, one man that they missed out on was Croatia international attacker Mislav Orsic – and that failed transfer was a blessing in disguise for the Baggies.

West Brom dodged a bullet with Mislav Orsic

Having been a relatively unheralded journeyman in the early part of his career with stints at Spezia, Rijeka, Jeonnam Dragons and Changchun Yatai, Mislav Orsic found his feet with Ulsan Hyundai in the K League.

After a year and a half with the South Korean giants, Orsic returned to his home country and joined the dominant force of Croatian football, Dinamo Zagreb, quickly establishing himself as a key man for them.

Still aged just 26 and approaching his supposed peak, Orsic put in some excellent performances for Dinamo, earning himself a call-up to the Croatian national side in 2019.

By January 2020, Orsic was expected to be a key man for the Croats, who had been FIFA World Cup runners’ up at their previous major international tournament, for that summer’s UEFA European Championship, which was eventually postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

With that pedigree and excitement, suggestions that West Brom could poach him from the Croatian giants were promising and suggested that Albion could land themselves a coup.

His move eventually fell through that window, though, and he remained in Croatia for a while – but it didn’t harm West Brom and the future unfolded in a positive manner for Bilic and the Baggies.

Failing to land his compatriot didn’t prevent Bilic from getting West Brom up to the top-flight behind closed doors in the summer of 2020 and, without Orsic, the likes of Krovinovic, Pereira and Diangana continued to thrive with other attacking options including Kenneth Zohore, Charlie Austin and Hal Robson-Kanu, as well as Robinson and Grosicki.

The signing of Orsic may well have complicated things for Bilic and prevented their eventual promotion and, given what eventually happened to the former Ulsan man, he wouldn’t have contributed much.

Mislav Orsic had his moments but flopped with Southampton

Mislav Orsic, who has spent this season with Pafos and played in the league phase of the UEFA Champions League, has certainly had some moments to suggest he could have been a worthwhile addition for Albion.

A match-winning hat-trick against Tottenham Hotspur in the knockout stages of the UEFA Europa League, reaching the quarter-finals for the first time in Dinamo’s history to scoring crucial winning goals against West Ham United and Chelsea.

At international level, the versatile attacker scored goals at both UEFA EURO 2020, in the knockout stages against Spain, and at the 2022 FIFA World Cup; the latter earning Croatia third place in Qatar.

The Croat even earned interest in himself from Premier League outfit Burnley in 2022 but he didn’t come to England until a move to Southampton in January 2023.

Signing for Nathan Jones’ Saints in the midst of their Premier League relegation, Orsic struggled to make an impact and wasn’t remotely trusted by Jones and then Ruben Selles, playing just one game in the top-flight before the end of the campaign.

Under the ownership of Sport Republic, Southampton have made plenty of very average signings and Orsic was yet another, with the now 33-year-old departing for Trabzonspor just a few months later.

Orsic was pretty much anonymous during his short stint down on the south coast and his failure to get anywhere near a genuinely woeful Saints