Albion’s comebacks against Marseille and Liverpool are testament to the character in the squad, according to Joel Veltman.
Roberto De Zerbi’s team came from 2-0 down to draw 2-2 in Marseille in the Europa League on Thursday, before securing a point against Liverpool after going a goal down on Sunday.
“We’ve shown a couple of times, like we did in Marseille, that we’ve got plenty of character,” our Dutchman said. “We wanted to push [against Liverpool] and the gaffer was like ‘come on, come on!’, but to be honest the energy was quite low.
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“You felt in the team we wanted to, but the next step for us is that energy, we didn’t quite have it because of the game on Thursday.
“Every game we’ve shown character, against a team today that wants a Champions League spot. 2-2 against this team, we have to be happy. We want to get better, but we can be happy.”
The 31-year-old reckons that we’re still adjusting to the rigours of European football.
“It’s the first time for the club [playing in Europe], so we need to get used to it – including me. The last time I played a European game was with Ajax five years ago. So it’s really tough.
“Maybe we underestimated how difficult it is, playing on Monday and Thursday. The travelling to Marseille and getting back late, then training on the Friday afternoon.”
The testing period saw Roberto De Zerbi make a total of 50 changes to his line-up in seven games, something Joel is confident that will pay dividends as the season progresses.
“The gaffer needs to make changes because of the amount of games. We have to get past those early pains at the beginning of the season and if you manage that well then you will profit from it later on in the season.”