West Brom confirm Tony Mowbray contract details and coaching team

West Bromwich Albion have confirmed that Tony Mowbray has returned to the club as the new head coach. Albion have been looking for a successor to Carlos Corberan since Christmas Eve, after the Spaniard returned home to manage boyhood club Valencia, and the club's headhunting search has led them back to a man who knows the Baggies all too well.

Mowbray, who was last at Birmingham City before stepping down last February after being diagnosed with bowel cancer, has recently received the medical all-clear to resume his managerial career and he has returned to The Hawthorns almost 16 years after he departed for Celtic.

Mowbray has signed a two-and-a-half-year contract with the club, who sit just outside of the Championship play-off places ahead of the welcoming of Stoke City on Saturday. Mowbray will take up the reins ahead of a poignant meeting with former club Middlesbrough on Tuesday night. He brings faithful assistant Mark Venus, who was also with him in his previous Albion stint, with him.

Chairman Shilen Patel said: "Tony’s return is driven by the excellent head coach he is now and while I know he is proud of his previous time with the Albion, his desire to achieve new success shone through from our first meeting.

"Tony has a wealth of experience across British football and shares our vision for the football club. He truly cares about bringing the best out of players and instils determination and commitment in his teams. I am thrilled he is our new head coach, and we are excited to welcome him back to write a new chapter in his Baggies story with his unwavering desire to compete and win."

"He's just a good football man," Chris Brunt, interim boss and the former winger who Mowbray signed, said. "He knows everything there is to know about football. He just enjoys it, he enjoys seeing his team playing attacking football and scoring goals. One thing I've noticed since he left, with Coventry, Blackburn and Sunderland, he was more pragmatic. He knew his teams couldn't all play the same football we did in 2008 and he adapted.

"That's a big thing for any manager, being able to adapt to what the squad can give you. That's your job as a head coach - you're getting the best out of the players and he's more than capable of doing that.

"He was good the two years I spent with him here. He signed me, he signed Mozza. I remember thinking coming down 'yeah, this is somebody I want to play for' as a player. I'm sure he's no different now. He's had well documented health issues and it's great to see him back fighting fit from that. I'm sure his enthusiasm for the game won't have changed and he'll hopefully be passing on the enthusiasm to the players as he did to us in 2008."

On incoming assistant Venus, who was most recently with Mowbray at Blues, Brunt - who worked with him between 2007 and 2009 - added: "He's a great guy, Veno. Him and Tony are quite different personality wise, Tony is quite reserved and Veno is a bit more outgoing, a bit more lively.

"The two of them work really well as a pair and it'll be interesting to see what they're like now - it's a bit worrying that it's more than 15 years ago, it's quite scary! I think the way things are now, I think he's an ideal fit for everybody. Let's hope he had the same success he had last time."

Albion are without top scorer Josh Maja for the foreseeable future after it was confirmed by the club that he would require surgery on his leg after suffering an injury setback. Mowbray won't be able to call on Maja until the spring time, with the 12-goal forward likely to be missing until March.

"I'm sure we'll be working hard behind the scenes to add to the squad after losing Josh," Brunt added. "We've been good defensively all season. The lads know their jobs on that front and now it's about maybe about finding more balance, to try and score more goals and that's something he'll perhaps look into. The lads have shown they're capable of chances and scoring goals. I think the foundations are all there for him to go and build on and be successful."

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