West Brom head coach Tony Mowbray has challenged his players to become more clinical after a 2-0 win against Oxford.
Former Oxford loan midfielder Alex Mowatt’s 11th-minute goal and substitute John Swift’s effort 11 minutes into added time moved the Baggies up to fifth in the Championship.
But Albion, who had 22 shots, should have won more comfortably.
Oxford goalkeeper Jamie Cumming denied Adam Armstrong, Jayson Molumby and Mowatt and the hosts wasted chances galore.
“We say the same every week,” said Mowbray. “We dominated Blackburn yet lost 2-0 after not taking our chances.
“We’ve got to get better at creating 20 chances and hitting the target in at least 10 of them and scoring three or four goals.
“At the moment we’re getting four or five on target out of 15 or 20 and we have to be more clinical.
“We have to find ways of getting behind them or playing through them.”
Mowbray felt his team did enough to return to winning ways after a defeat to Blackburn and a draw with Millwall.
“It was a deserved win and the right result if there is such a thing,” he added.
“It was tighter than we would have liked with them having long throw-ins at the end.
“But we dominated for long spells and played a lot of the game in their half of the pitch and our goalkeeper didn’t have to make a save.”
Oxford head coach Gary Rowett claimed his side were denied a penalty for handball at 1-0 when Cameron Brannagan’s shot hit a West Brom defender.
“I’ve watched it back and it was a blatant penalty – Brannagan’s shot was blocked by their guy who had his arm outstretched,” Rowett said.
“I think seven of our players appealed instantly and it was a moment that could have got us something.”
Rowett added: “It was a poor start from us and we allowed them to dictate the game but Tony Mowbray teams do that.
“It would help not to concede a goal after 11 minutes although it was good play from them.
“After that we huffed and puffed but we put them under some good pressure with five, 10 minutes to go.”
Oxford, now winless in six, have not scored int heir last four matches.
But Rowett said: “Of course when you have a period when you don’t score it weighs on people’s minds.
“When you’re a defender and you go a goal down, you think, ‘are we going to score two to win?’
“But when we won five and drew four of our first 13 games I wasn’t thinking we were going to score three every game.”
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