Analysis: West Brom show there is plenty in reserve with FA Cup draw at Brighton

Crystal Palace comprehensively beat the Baggies 3-0 that night, delivering a lesson to some of Darren Moore’s youngsters.

Eagles have sharper talons than Seagulls of course, that much was clear on Saturday, when Brighton flapped around and made a lot of fuss without piercing the skin.

But the strides made by Albion’s youngsters in the past four months should not be downplayed.

There’s a reason the 3,500 travelling Baggies roared them off the pitch, even though they’d braved a six-hour round trip to see the club’s first goalless draw of the season.

The headline news is that Moore named seven academy graduates in his squad. Five of them played. Four of them started.

But this wasn’t just about Sam Field’s maturity at the base of midfield, Kyle Edwards’s ability to adapt to a new role, Rekeem Harper’s fourth game in a row, or Rayhaan Tulloch’s debut.

This was about reassuringly and surprisingly impressive performances from summer signings Kyle Bartley, Conor Townsend and Jonathan Bond.

It was Wes Hoolahan and Tyrone Mears showing why Moore signed them in the first place and a suggestion that keeping them beyond this month may not be bad business.

Most of all though, it was about competition and confidence within the squad, because this second string did what the first XI tried to do at the start of the season.

They played it out from the back and through their Premier League opposition with a composure that failed the team back in September.

Brighton’s team was also much-changed, with big hitters Pascal Gross and Glenn Murray on the bench. But it wasn’t as ‘weak’ – for want of a better word – as Albion’s was.

Jurgen Locadia cost £16m, Yves Bissouma was £15m, while Moore’s side was a mixture of youth team players, loanees, and frees.

The Baggies only paid a transfer fee for two of their starting XI.

Bissouma’s class shone early on, and 15 minutes into the match it looked like the former Lille player was going to control proceedings.

But in the second half, Albion’s academy trio in midfield grew in stature.

Field mopped up danger in his preferred holding midfield role with minimum of fuss, before setting the Baggies off with that cultured left foot.

How apt the 20-year-old should prefer that leg, just like the men he is being nurtured to emulate, Chris Brunt and Gareth Barry.

This was the Field many had hoped to see this season, and the confidence no doubt gleaned from last Monday’s goal against Bolton was evident.

Ahead of him Edwards and Harper carried the ball with pace and purpose, aided by Wes Hoolahan, dropping so deep from his false nine position he was practically another midfielder.

Too many attacks stuttered up top, where Jonathan Leko and Hal Robson-Kanu failed to make it stick under the Goliath grip of Shane Duffy and Dan Burn.

Leko deserves sympathy, because he was playing out of position, but he was not at his scintillating best, and wasted too many chances to run at the Brighton back-line.

Talented as he is, his end-product requires work. The good news for him is that Moore seems keen to work on it.

If Brighton’s back-line were enjoying a good day, it was nothing compared to Albion’s.

Based on this, Moore needs no additions to his defence in the final 90 hours of the transfer window.

Mears and Townsend were solid at full-back, and still provided an attacking outlet, but it was the centre-backs who shone.

Adarabioyo proved why Manchester City have high hopes for him with a diamond performance – beautiful yet tough.

It appeared to rub off on Bartley, who shone himself at right centre-back, proving he was being played out of position earlier this season.

He looked calm stepping out with the ball and defended resolutely.

But if the day was anyone’s it was Bond’s, who is now a double 0 agent following his second clean sheet in his second ever game for the club.

His gold fingers stretched to every shot that came his way and even when Chris Hughton sent for Murray, he couldn’t be broken.

Boaz has leapfrogged Boaz Myhill in the pecking order, and at 25, still has plenty years left in the field.

With so many Premier League casualties in the third and fourth rounds, less than half of the teams in the last 16 will come from the top tier.

Get past Brighton in eight days’ time and earn a favourable draw tonight, there’s no reason why this side can’t try to emulate Tony Mowbray’s vintage from 11 years ago, who won promotion while reaching the semi-finals.

Winning breeds a winning mentality, and while it’s clear Moore was never going to risk his main lieutenants in this game ahead of a daunting fixture pile-up in February, the wider ramifications of this performance could be huge.

In the short-term it keeps the starting XI on their toes, safe in the knowledge that behind them is a hungry pack ready to take their place.

In the long-term it suggests a marriage between Moore and the academy could prove fruitful.

Seven of the starting XI were 25 or under, and just one of those is on loan.

These players have already come a long way since September. How far can they go?