Luke Hatfield would be "massively surprised" to see Valerien Ismael sacked by West Brom in the near future.

The Frenchman has led the Baggies to 3rd in the Championship table heading into the international break but has come under scrutiny from the Hawthorns faithful for his style of football.

How have West Brom performed under Ismael?

It's been a strange campaign for the Baggies, who might sit just one place off the automatic promotion spots but haven't had it all their own way.

Initially, Ismael made an excellent start to his West Brom stint, leading the side to six victories and four draws from his opening 10 league games.

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However, since their unbeaten start was ended at Stoke at the beginning of October, the Midlands outfit have been finding wins hard to come by.

Including that slender defeat to the Potters, Ismael's men have collected just 10 points from a possible 21 available and whilst they're still just once place behind the top-two, West Brom have slipped six points behind Fulham in second, with a far worse goal difference than the Cottagers.

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ENTER GIVEAWAY

Despite their inconsistent form of late, Hatfield thinks that talk about Ismael being removed by Li Piyue with their current league position is a stretch too far.

What did Hatfield say?

He told GIVEMESPORT: "If they were 11th or 12th in the table and they weren't getting results then there would be an argument, but with the team 3rd in the table and still in with a really good shout of those top-two spots, I would be massively surprised if they were to pull the trigger."

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Does Ismael deserve time?

When the football isn't attractive and the results are good, fans are likely to be content, but when the results aren't there, like they haven't been of late, you're in trouble.

But as Hatfield said, West Brom are still 3rd in the Championship standings and are only a couple of victories away from playing themselves back into top-two contention.

On that other hand, Bournemouth and Fulham are looking faultless right now, which means the Baggies are essentially only a few bad results away from being out of the top-two race already.

Even if West Brom do drop further off the pace, Ismael should be given the whole season to see if he can gain promotion through the play-offs, though.