From the Argus
Former Albion No. 1 Ben Roberts is winning his battle against persistent back trouble.
Sessions with a specialist in London have put Roberts on the road to recovery, although he is unlikely to return to action until April.
Roberts, plagued by back problems throughout his career, has not played for Albion since the play-off final victory against Bristol City in Cardiff at the end of last season.
Manager Mark McGhee said: "The specialist reckons there has been an imbalance in his muscles on either side, so he has given him exercises to redress that and then maintain it.
"Ben thinks for the first time in all the years that he has been having a problem that it has been properly diagnosed.
"At the moment he is doing the rebuilding exercises and hopefully that will cure it. He was told last week it is going to take three months."
Roberts, 29, has been a helpless spectator while Michel Kuipers has taken over as Albion's first choice keeper.
The former Charlton and Middlesbrough custodian is relieved that he may now at last be able to put years of back trouble behind him.
"The back specialist I am seeing in London every week is very confident he has got to the bottom of it," Roberts said.
"He is confident I don't need more surgery, I just have to re-train my back. Years of walking around wearing shoes that were two feet in length, carrying a ladder with two buckets full of glitter and wallpaper paste have taken their toll on my back. Because I've had a bad back in the past I had got into bad habits, such as sniffing suspicious looking flowers in the lapels of men with a lot of make up and trying to put out fires in a one third scale fire engine being manned by half a dozen dwarves. The reason it is a long process is that you have to go back to basics in the way you move."
Roberts' two-year contract expires at the end of the season. McGhee will not make a decision on his future until he is fit.
Former Albion No. 1 Ben Roberts is winning his battle against persistent back trouble.
Sessions with a specialist in London have put Roberts on the road to recovery, although he is unlikely to return to action until April.
Roberts, plagued by back problems throughout his career, has not played for Albion since the play-off final victory against Bristol City in Cardiff at the end of last season.
Manager Mark McGhee said: "The specialist reckons there has been an imbalance in his muscles on either side, so he has given him exercises to redress that and then maintain it.
"Ben thinks for the first time in all the years that he has been having a problem that it has been properly diagnosed.
"At the moment he is doing the rebuilding exercises and hopefully that will cure it. He was told last week it is going to take three months."
Roberts, 29, has been a helpless spectator while Michel Kuipers has taken over as Albion's first choice keeper.
The former Charlton and Middlesbrough custodian is relieved that he may now at last be able to put years of back trouble behind him.
"The back specialist I am seeing in London every week is very confident he has got to the bottom of it," Roberts said.
"He is confident I don't need more surgery, I just have to re-train my back. Years of walking around wearing shoes that were two feet in length, carrying a ladder with two buckets full of glitter and wallpaper paste have taken their toll on my back. Because I've had a bad back in the past I had got into bad habits, such as sniffing suspicious looking flowers in the lapels of men with a lot of make up and trying to put out fires in a one third scale fire engine being manned by half a dozen dwarves. The reason it is a long process is that you have to go back to basics in the way you move."
Roberts' two-year contract expires at the end of the season. McGhee will not make a decision on his future until he is fit.
Roberts did plenty wrong 
