91Èȱ¬

New West Brom head coach Tony Pulis says he was only brought in because "the club was starting to become complacent in lots of respects".

Pulis replaced Alan Irvine on 1 January when Albion, currently playing in their fifth successive season in the Premier League, were 17th in the table.

"Have a look at the Championship and how many teams who had long periods in the Premier League," said Pulis.

"What they did was take their foot off the pedal and became complacent."

Speaking after Saturday's 1-0 win over Hull City, his first league victory since taking charge, Pulis told 91Èȱ¬ WM 95.6: "We've got to shake the complacency off.

"It's not easy to do and we haven't got a lot of time to do it."

Having started with a 7-0 FA Cup third-round win over Gateshead, Pulis has now taken two charge of two matches in which his side kept clean sheets.

But they remain part of a bottom nine in the Premier League who are separated only by five points.

Albion know they must maintain that improvement, mindful of an end-of-season five-match run-in that involves home games against Liverpool and Chelsea, interspersed with trips to Manchester United, Newcastle and Arsenal.

Albion's next test is at Goodison Park next Monday night when they take on Everton, one of their rivals in the bottom half of the Premier League.