Graphic: The mini-Gunners

“The other day someone called us ‘the little Arsenal,’ ” Jonathan Greening, the West Bromwich Albion captain, said. “They said we play good football but we are seen as a soft touch. But plenty of people said we’d never get promoted last season playing the way we did and we went up as champions.”

While Arsenal were proving anything but a soft touch on Saturday, Albion played their usual open game against Liverpool at Anfield, lost 3-0 and stayed in the bottom three. It takes courage to stick to one’s beliefs in the circumstances, but Greening has faith in the methods of Tony Mowbray, the manager, and seems no more worried about their prospects than he was by the autograph-hungry schoolkids who mobbed him last week on a visit to a local school as part of the Premier League’s Creating Chances programme.

“Everyone believes in each other and the manager,” Greening said. “When I was at Middlesbrough he was a legend as a no-nonsense centre half. He’d kick his own grandmother, people used to say. But that isn’t how he likes his team to play and anyway we haven’t got a Rory Delap like Stoke City.

“Of course we don’t want people to say, ‘West Brom played good football but weren’t good enough to stay in the Premier League’, but we want to prove that it can be done and that we are capable of doing it, and the mood is still upbeat. It has been great being back after two years out of the Premier League, playing against teams like Arsenal and Man U, and we believe we could have had another six, seven, eight points but for some silly mistakes.”

Although a proud son of North Yorkshire, Greening, 29, claims that joining West Brom from Middlesbrough in 2004 was the best move he made. However, it may not have happened but for an act that also required courage three years earlier, when he told Sir Alex Ferguson that he wanted to leave Manchester United three seasons after joining them from York City for £500,000. “It took me an hour to knock on his door,” he said. “But it was time.

“I’d made, I think, 34 appearances in three years, and never played two consecutive games. He didn’t take it very well. He offered me a new four-year contract straight away, but I told him it wasn’t about the contract — I needed to start playing. I needed to be brave and thank goodness, looking back, that I was.

“He must have thought a lot of me if he wanted me to stay, but they had just signed [Juan Sebastian] Verón for £32 million and there was never a chance I was going to play regularly.”

After moving on from Middlesbrough to The Hawthorns for what now appears a bargain £1.25 million, Greening helped West Brom to survive their first Premier League season and stayed despite relegation the next year and defeat in the 2007 play-offs final. “It was disappointing, but I knew the way the gaffer wanted to go and I wanted to stay,” he said. “I signed a new three-year contract and was given the captain’s armband five days later. It was the best week ever and it has gone from there. Lifting the [Coca-Cola Championship] trophy last season was amazing.”

Greening was visiting Nether Stowe High School in Lichfield as part of the club’s IMPACT education programme, which uses football to help children to progress in maths, English and computer studies. “It’s great to see their faces light up,” Greening said. “I’ve got three kids so I know how enthusiastic they can get. I signed a few shirts and ties. I’ll probably get a bill from some parents saying I owe them for a new shirt.”

After facing down Ferguson, Greening may not be too concerned at that prospect.