And midfielders says there has been no post-Villa blame game
YOUSSOUF Mulumbu says Luis Suarez is one of the best players in England - but insists his Albion team-mates do not have time to fear the Barclays Premier League’s top goalscorer ahead of Sunday’s Hawthorns clash with Liverpool (ko 1.30pm).
The Reds are the Barclays Premier League’s second-highest scorers so far this term – and the Uruguay international striker has grabbed 23 of their 57 goals.
But Mulumbu believes the Baggies are capable of upsetting the Merseyside outfit if they can remain 100 per cent focused.
“It is a game against one of the biggest teams in the league,” he said.
“We need to be 100 per cent focused if we are to challenge them.
“We will fight against Liverpool and we’ll see what happens.
“We know they are in top form, they scored four goals against Everton and kept a clean sheet.
“But we will be ready for them.
“Suarez is one of the best players in the league but we haven’t got time to be scared of him or Liverpool.
“If we pass the ball well and score some goals then we will not be worrying about them.
“Any Premier League player will perform if they are not put under pressure so we need to make sure we don’t allow Liverpool to play with too much freedom on Sunday.
“We won’t go onto the pitch in fear.”
The midfielder admits mistakes were made during the 4-3 derby defeat by Villa on Wednesday – but is adamant no one inside the camp has been pointing fingers.
“Obviously we’re really disappointed after the Villa game,” added Mulumbu.
“When you score two goals early on you feel like you’ve done a lot of the work.
“We have analysed the game and we know that we made some mistakes as a team.
“We haven’t pointed the finger at individuals but we know we have to be better against Liverpool.
“The league is really tight and if we had beaten Villa we would have gone into the top half.
“We scored three goals against Villa and if we repair the defensive mistakes then we have a chance against Liverpool.”