West Brom sniffing around Leeds United stars TSS March 15, 2011 Leeds United 96 Comments Another week and another dose of reported interested in our rising stars. This time West Brom are the team being linked, and the players involved are Robert Snodgrass and Jonny Howson. The story, published in The People claims West Brom scouts were in attendance as Robert Snodgrass and Jonny Howson strutted their stuff in a recent Championship game. While this isn’t the most unbelievable link I’ve heard this season, the story does start to fall apart a little when The People claim the pair would fetch a fee in excess of £2m. If by ‘in excess’ they mean more than £6m, then the call to Elland Road early June may not result in Shaun Harvey and Ken Bates rolling around on the floor in fits of uncontrollable laughter. But even if West Brom can scrape together enough money to tempt the Elland Road chairman into a sale, they still have to convince the local born, Leeds United supporting captain of our football club that a life of tedious mediocrity living in the shadows of Birmingham and Villa would be better than playing as the homegrown hero at Elland Road. Even Robert Snodgrass, whose only real allegiance to Leeds United is the opportunity we gave him to impress English football could be a hard player to tempt. Money is no motivation to the Scottish star, he proved that when he joined Livingston over Celtic a few years ago. He’s also stated publicly that his goal is to become immortalised at Elland Road, like the Scottish greats that preceded him – Eddie Gray, Billy Bremner and Gordon Strachan to name but a few. Both players are happy at Elland Road, and whilst they both have dreams of Premier League football I’m sure neither of them would want to take any shortcuts and join one of the least interesting clubs in the Premier League. Jonny Howson is ‘living the dream,’ playing for the club he grew up idolising, whilst Robert Snodgrass is enjoying his football and seems happy to be a part of a club where Scottish legends like Peter Lorimer and Eddie Gray are always on hand for a bit of professional guidance. In my slightly biased opinion, I think West Brom are barking up the wrong tree with this one. Their scouts’ time would be better spent observing their next opponents, before the Premier League status they were relying on to turn players heads is nothing more than a distant memory.