{"id":565939,"date":"2020-09-15T11:40:44","date_gmt":"2020-09-15T15:40:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/?p=565939"},"modified":"2020-09-15T11:40:44","modified_gmt":"2020-09-15T15:40:44","slug":"branislav-ivanovic-completes-west-bromwich-albion-move","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/2020\/09\/15\/branislav-ivanovic-completes-west-bromwich-albion-move\/","title":{"rendered":"Branislav Ivanovi\u0107 Completes West Bromwich Albion Move"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">Former<a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/clubs\/chelsea\/\" target=\"_self\"> Chelsea<\/a> defender,<a href=\"https:\/\/fbref.com\/en\/players\/85f8571a\/Branislav-Ivanovic\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"> Branislav Ivanovi\u0107<\/a> has officially completed a move to newly-promoted side <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/clubs\/west-brom\/\" target=\"_self\">West Bromwich Albion<\/a>, signing a one year deal. The defender arrives at the perfect time as West Brom look to complete a season of survival. He could come straight into the lineup, too, following West Brom&#8217;s opening day 3-0 defeat at the hands of <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/clubs\/leicester-city\/\" target=\"_self\">Leicester City.<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<h2><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">Ivanovi\u0107 Completes West Brom Move<\/span><\/h2>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"und\">Welcome to West Bromwich Albion, Branislav Ivanovi\u0107 \u270d\ufe0f\ud83c\uddf7\ud83c\uddf8 <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/kXDjQpbmdm\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">pic.twitter.com\/kXDjQpbmdm<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 West Bromwich Albion (@WBA) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/WBA\/status\/1305885766694957057?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">September 15, 2020<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<h3><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">A Return to the Premier League with West Bromwich Albion for Ivanovi\u0107<\/span><\/h3>\n<p><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">Branislav Ivanovi\u0107 is undoubtedly one of the greatest fullbacks to grace the Premier League. The Serbian defender won it all while in England, from Premier League titles, League and FA Cups, to the ultimate glory of lifting the Champions League trophy a high.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">Now, he has a different challenge in front of him, however. And perhaps his toughest yet. Instead of the almost guaranteed glory of Chelsea, Ivanovi\u0107 will be faced with the task of keeping West Brom afloat.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">For the first time in his illustrious career, he will be asked to play on the back foot with wave after wave of attacking play coming towards him. At 36 years old, he&#8217;ll have the experience to lead the backline, but the question still remains unanswered of whether he will have the legs.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">Ivanovi\u0107&#8217;s leadership could be the difference-maker for West Brom as they seek a second season in the Premier League.<\/span><\/p>\n<h3><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">What Was Said?<\/span><\/h3>\n<p><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">After putting pen to paper, Ivanovi\u0107 told the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wba.co.uk\/news\/branislav-ivanovic-joins-albion\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">club website<\/a>:\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">\u201cThe Premier League is the best league in the world.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">\u201cI need to challenge myself and I am ready for the challenge. I am really happy to be back playing in the Premier League.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">\u201cI hope I am going to be successful here.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">\u201cI have a lot of ambition and I want to prove a lot of things. I will give everything for the team.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">West Brom boss Slaven Bili\u0107 then went onto say: \u201cHe\u2019s a great addition for us, a team who are newly promoted in the Premier League. He ticks all the boxes for us.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">\u201cHe&#8217;s done everything in his career &#8211; it&#8217;s been magnificent. We&#8217;re delighted. He adds quality and experience on the pitch and off the pitch.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">\u201cSo it is not only him, it is him plus the influence he will have on not just defenders but the whole team around him. That&#8217;s why we targeted him as one of our prime targets.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">\u201cIt\u2019s a great signing for us.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p>Main Photo<br \/>\n<a id=\"vQ15T1awTvVf7Qho-gcYhw\" class=\"gie-single\" style=\"color: #a7a7a7; text-decoration: none; font-weight: normal !important; border: none; display: inline-block;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.co.uk\/detail\/1188125353\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Embed from Getty Images<\/a><script>window.gie=window.gie||function(c){(gie.q=gie.q||[]).push(c)};gie(function(){gie.widgets.load({id:'vQ15T1awTvVf7Qho-gcYhw',sig:'6Hl8y99y_1Q3sxOLLmLweyvqzPy4Tp1_n_a1melb1rg=',w:'594px',h:'396px',items:'1188125353',caption: true ,tld:'co.uk',is360: false })});<\/script><script src='\/\/embed-cdn.gettyimages.com\/widgets.js' charset='utf-8' async><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Former Chelsea defender, Branislav Ivanovi\u0107 has officially completed a move to newly-promoted side West Bromwich Albion, signing a one year deal. The defender arrives at the perfect time as West Brom look to complete a season of survival. He could come straight into the lineup, too, following West Brom&#8217;s opening day 3-0 defeat at the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3402,"featured_media":565940,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[26,3,28],"tags":[5101,2089,46,132,136],"class_list":["post-565939","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-west-brom","category-premier-league","category-transfers","tag-2020-2021-premier-league","tag-branislav-ivanovic","tag-chelsea","tag-west-bromwich-albion","tag-world-football"],"modified_by":"Tom Cunningham, Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/565939","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3402"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=565939"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/565939\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/565940"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=565939"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=565939"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=565939"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}