Jeremy Peace has revealed the latest step in his redevelopment of West Bromwich-Albion by confirming that the club are to seek full Football Association Academy status.

Mindful of the fact that the Baggies have not produced any established top-flight stars since the emergence of Carlton Palmer and David Burrows in the early-1980's, the Albion chairman wants to see more players come through the youth system.

Although they have a flourishing Centre of Excellence under the supervision of Dan Ashworth, Albion have plans to build an indoor training facility at their Walsall Road training ground - the most expensive part of an operation that will see them earn full Academy status.

The recent appointment of Education Officer Mark Harrison, another requirement of the Premier League's guidelines, has shown how serious Albion are in their wish to tap into their share of budding players from the densely-populated West Midlands.

Neighbours Wolverhampton Wanderers, Aston Villa and Birmingham City are ahead of Albion in terms of recruiting and nurturing young players.

Albion have received help and encouragement from Wolves in setting up their blueprint for the future and Peace is heartened at how things are slotting into place.

"We're a Centre of Excellence club and we want to be an Academy club," he said.

"Subject to planning consent, we're hopefully going to build an indoor facility over the next 12 months down at the training ground.

"If we can move the club on in that department and get a flow of younger players coming through, it will help the club in the long term, particularly given the latest proposals from UEFA about clubs using more home-grown players.

"The problem with the West Midlands area is that there is a lot of competition, with four clubs vying for the same players.

"We've had only a trickle of young players through; Carlton Palmer was probably the last decent one, but if we can get the indoor facility built and get Academy status, we can keep moving on and get our recruitment policy right.

"It's a long-term view from under-nines upwards and some people say we're looking at a five-year cycle, some say seven.

"But I'm really encouraged by the people we've got here now. Even in the short time he's been here, Bryan Robson has been very good with it, having helped set up the system at Middlesbrough.

"He's very keen on it and has shown that by already having two lads from the youth team training with the first team. I'm really encouraged that we've got a manager who clearly wants to play a big part."

As for the present firstteam squad, Robson has two specific cases of players who might need a protective arm thrown around them.

Skipper Darren Purse lost his place to Thomas Gaardsoe and the captain's armband to Kevin Campbell for Saturday's FA Cup fourth-round replay at Tottenham.

Purse was the one to pay the price for the succession of defensive errors that have cost Albion points lately, but Robson said it was a tough decision to make in dropping his captain.

"For 85 minutes in a game, Darren is absolutely outstanding," he explained. "But, for the odd five minutes, he has lapses and it has simply cost us too many times. I just felt it was a chance for Thomas Gaardsoe to come in and prove that he was not going to let us down and I thought he did pretty well."

Robson is optimistic about Albion's forgotten man Lee Marshall to whom he has offered a first-team lifeline as he tries to recover not only from a broken leg but a case of 'cold shoulder'.

Marshall found himself training with the club's youngsters, banished to the reserves and not even given a squad number for this campaign after a massive fall-out with previous manager Gary Megson.

However, in the same way that he has reopened the door for Ronnie Wallwork and Jason Koumas, Robson has restored the 26-year-old former Leicester City player to his first-team squad.