Premier League: West Brom's Brown Ideye may be fit enough to play next weekend

West Brom manager Alan Irvine says he is hopeful Brown Ideye will be fit enough to feature in the Premier League opener at home to Sunderland next Saturday.

The club record signing only arrived at the club on Friday after a lengthy wait for a visa, and the Nigeria international forward sat out Saturday’s 3-1 friendly loss to Porto.

However, Irvine thinks Ideye, who has been signed from Dynamo Kiev for around £10m, may be able to play some part next weekend.

"We're trying to gauge where he is in terms of his fitness," Irvine told the West Brom website on Sunday.

"The situation at the moment is that he trained yesterday and he'll train again today. We'll talk on Monday regarding where we think he is.

"If he's ready to play some part against Sunderland, that would be great. I know he trained extremely well yesterday and we need to see what the effect of that is.

"He didn’t do a lot of pre-season with Dynamo Kiev, so we're relying a lot on his natural fitness and athleticism, rather than something that has been worked on."

Two other West Brom recruits, Jason Davidson and Cristian Gamboa, also sat out the Porto match.

"It's a case of fitness with Jason Davidson," Irvine added.

"Cristian's not even in the country yet, so he definitely couldn't have played!

"We're trying to get Jason as much training as we can. He trained yesterday and will train again today."