ONWARDS and upwards was the message from Aidy Boothroyd tonight as his players bounced back from the ignominy of defeat in midweek, by taking a hard-earned point from The Hawthorns.

Going a goal up through Leigh Bromby, the manager was hopeful that his side would have gone on to secure the win against West Brom, but he was let down when poor marking allowed Leon Barnett to net at the other end and bring the scores level.

Speaking after the game, the manager said: "I think that we stuck to what we talked about doing in the first half, got the goal and had further opportunities to score and didn't take them. I thought we were the better side and deserved the lead.

"Then we defended poorly at a set play and got done when Leon Barnett scored and then I thought we sat a bit too deep. West Brom are a good side and you know they are going to come at you. I didn't think we did enough in the second half; they won the second half fair and square.

"I'm disappointed that we've not got three points. We had to show a lot of character, it was 'backs against the wall' kind of stuff today."

With three big doubts clouding Boothroyd's team selection, he was pleased to see all of the injured players make it through to the game, with Darius Henderson, Tommy Smith and Nathan Ellington making it through to today's encounter.

"I was thrilled when I got the result back on Thursday that he [Darius] only had a cramp in his leg, which tells you what he was like.

Henderson was joined up front by Tamas Priskin, who returned to the starting XI following a period on loan at Preston.

On the Hungarian Boothroyd said: "Tamas has done really well, I've kept a close eye on his progress and spoke to Alan Irvine [the Preston manager] a lot.

"I just thought today he has not played up there with Darius and he has composure. He is working his socks off and I asked him to do a job. He's clever and cute and put a great back heel into Tommy Smith to score in the first half."

The outpouring after Wednesday's Barnsley defeat will still take time to leave the system, but for Boothroyd this was a start at putting things right.

"I was more disappointed with what I got on Wednesday and that will rankle with me for a long time. I guess I should let it go, it's done.

"Football fans want to win and they expect to win home games, so do I. Therefore the person they vent the anger on is me, I'll take that because I take the pats on the back when they come."

His side now sit three points off top and two points from the automatic spots and Boothroyd knows that these small margins will remain right until the last kick of the season, signing off with: "It looks like it's going to go right to the wire, but we're still in there."