Hodgson eyes West Brom safety

West Bromwich Albion manager Roy Hodgson believes his team are closing in on English Premier League safety after beating Sunderland 4-0.

A brace from Peter Odemwingie, together with goals from James Morrison and Keith Andrews, sealed a comprehensive win for West Brom in Saturday’s match at The Hawthorns.

The victory leaves West Brom 12th on the table, 11 points clear of the relegation zone, and Hodgson feels the club will soon be able to begin planning their third successive campaign in the top flight.

“There are still 12 games to play and we will lose some of those because they are tough fixtures against a lot of teams above us,” Hodgson said.

“But it’s an 11-point gap plus … a better goal difference. That is an awful lot of points.”

“Our aim is to stay in this league for a third successive season but I don’t think I need to be worrying too much about asking questions about relegation when we are effectively 12 points clear.”

“There are 12 games left to play and all the teams at the bottom haven’t got a point a game on average.”

“They had better start getting more points than they have in the last 26 games otherwise they won’t reach us.”

Sunderland manager Martin O’Neill rued his team’s inability to recover from conceding just six minutes after kick-off.

“The early goal knocked us back a bit but it shouldn’t have done,” O’Neill said.

“It shouldn’t be a decisive moment.”

“We were second best for all of the first half and at the end of the day we were deservedly beaten.”

“It was a tough one to take because it was certainly unlike us in recent times not to compete and just have a real appetite for it.”

“At this moment we are not good enough to go 10 to 15 minutes in a game and play second fiddle to teams.”

“We had to work really hard to beat Arsenal in the FA Cup and today we didn’t seem to have that energy. There is no excuse. We were well beaten.”