Sunday 21 February 2010

Play-Off Push Stalls

“Play to the bloody whistle,” screamed Mick from the touchline. The ref hadn’t given a free-kick; but there I was, 40 yards away from the play, whining about a decision going against me.

The other side didn’t score from that move, but I still got a rollicking from my coach. Rightly so. I mean, it was huge game after all – a top-of-the-table clash with Riverside Rovers in the Teesside Junior Alliance Under-14s Division Three.

We went on to get beat, while Rovers marched on to promotion. But for the remainder of that season – and the remainder of my fledgling Sunday morning football career – I would never stop playing until the man in black blew his whistle.

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Lita celebrates a goal at QPR earlier in the season

Every 13-year-old is told the same. And presumably Leroy Lita was no different. Yet yesterday afternoon, the 25-year-old had a Michael Hunter circa 2000 moment.

He might have deserved a free-kick on the edge of the Forest box after Kelvin Wilson manhandled him from behind. But Lita, frustrated, stopped still and flung his arms in the air. If he’d put Wilson under pressure instead, the lanky centre-half might not have been able to pick out a teammate; and the home side might not have went on to create their game-winning chance for Chris Cohen.

Aside from that, it’s hard to criticise the team’s performance. A nil-nil would have been a fairer result, despite Forest crafting out one or two clearer openings. We were full of endeavour, and seemed a little more willing to get on the ball. Unfortunately, we found Forest’s rearguard too tough break down, much like the promotion hopefuls found Wheater and McManus difficult to penetrate.

The frontline of McDonald and Aliadiere – our 14th different strike pairing of the season – was ineffective. They offer similar attributes – both relying on cute balls into the channels – and both would be more threatening with a big, bruising foil in the mould of Kiwi Chris Killen, who was on the bench after an injury niggle.

Despite his costly histrionics, I still rate Lita as our best striker. He’s strong, he’s quick, and he’s willing and able to fashion his own chances. Same can’t be said of Ali, who again had a lacklustre game along with Boro’s other one-time Premier League regulars.

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Poor: Arca has barely shone in a Boro shirt

Pogatetz and, in particular, Arca, were guilty of slack moments down the left. The latter is fast becoming the pantomime villain among the Boro faithful – his every hopeless pass and missed tackle met with suggestions of a return to Argentina – and his days at the Riverside are numbered under Strachan if heartless performances like yesterday’s continue.

The play-offs are now an even more distant hope than they were at the start of the weekend. And as miserable as that might sound, we can console ourselves by remembering there are others who are worse off right now.

Sunday 31 January 2010

Deadline Drag

I wish this transfer window would hurry up and shut. Not just to stop our best player joining Man City's reserves, but also to stop some of the tripe potentially coming in.

What's City's motive for making a bid for Johnson right now anyway? They've got Petrov and Bellamy already vying for their left-wing spot, so you'd assume Jonno might have to re-accustom himself to a bit of second XI football initially.

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Johnson spent years in the shadow of Stewart Downing

I don't blame him for wanting to speak to City - it's an exciting time on the blue side of Manchester at the moment - but I hope he declines for now. A move to Eastlands would not be of benefit to anyone or anything but his bank balance.

Don't get me wrong; I back him to be a success eventually. But Bellamy has been their best player this season in his position. Johnson will not break into the City side over the next six months and earn a shock place in Fabio's World Cup 23 (though I wouldn't against him featuring in the next major tournament). And Boro will be left even further away from appeasing increasingly disgruntled supporters.

His Riverside contract expires at the end of this season, at which point he'll undoubtedly move on. Only difference is, wherever he goes, he'll leave haven given his first club every chance of promotion - however faint our hopes might be.

Now I'm not naive enough to think Johnson will be worried about his legacy at a club which barely showed faith in him until its previous left-wing wonder left the club. He owes us nothing.

But his talent isn't going to go away in the second half of a Chamionship season. In fact, his stock can only rise as he's guaranteed to dismantle many more second-tier defences between now and May.

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Lee Miller (left) is unlikely to solve Boro's striking woes

In all honesty, this blog post is more a plea than a rationale. But it's about as much as I can muster amid thoughts of a Boro side Johnsonless. His sale would be like pulling the last incisor from our near-toothless penetration in the final third. Also, it would also be another stick for supporters to hit the club with - more apparent lack of ambition at the top of the hierarchy.

To top the gloomy prospect of Johnson leaving, Strachan was today linked with Lee Miller, a striker whose last stint in English football yielded eight goals in 42 games. And that was in League One. Hopefully the same person who was charged handling the paperwork on Chris Smalling's proposed transfer last season is dealing with Miller's too.

Sunday 17 January 2010

Lost In Transition

Middlesbrough Football Club will still be playing Championship football this time next year. The good news for fellow Boro fans is that’s merely my opinion: the bad news is I’m probably right.

We were nothing better than average at Bramall Lane yesterday. Perhaps worse. Lots of endeavour and application but not a sniff of a goal threat.

What’s most frustrating, though, is that the opposition were no better than us in almost every area. But in the most crucial – making chances from which you might get a goal – they were.

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Sheffield United: Ugly but effective

It would be a travesty if Sheff Utd were promoted this season. Not at our expense, of course; but at the expense of other play-off candidates. They’re such an ugly team to watch. I don’t know why they bother paying those lads to rake the pitch before each half because the ball barely touches it.

And when Boro did try to play a bit (which, admittedly, wasn’t a great deal) a Blades player was quick to blunt the move with a cynical foul. Twenty-two quid was the cheapest adult ticket for yesterday’s game - you can get something more attractive for that money down the Bongo International on a Saturday night.

While their approach might not be pretty, it is effective. The Blades grind out wins and are frustratingly difficult to beat.

The same can’t be said for Boro at the moment. We went one down and it was curtains. Again the team appeared to surrender. Sure, we might have had a penalty and Barry Robson spurned a half-chance from six yards, but that was our lot.

Boro have long been mentally brittle. We’ve taken only three points from losing positions this season – a 3-1 win under Southgate at Sheff Wed in September – and I don’t envisage that bouncebackability block easing soon.

Thing is, neither does Strachan. And I doubt he’ll be satisfied with his squad until it has been completely overhauled.

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Mark Yeates has moved on after just six months on Teesside

Yeates is the latest of Southgate's flops to be shown in the exit door in a transitional period which is bound to have a negative impact on the squad. Only when this transfer window slams shut can we really begin to consider the virtues of Gordon's wisdom.

What’s curious, however, is how the Boro faithful have seemingly concluded that weak links like Arca, McMahon, Hoyte, Jones, Ali and Emnes are the most telling factor(s) in our downfall.

Yet these are the players who helped put us a point behind Newcastle on the night that Gareth Southgate was deemed surplus to requirements at the Riverside. (The Championship table didn't make for quite so dismal reading back on October 20, did it?)

Three months on and the chances of a top flight return for Boro have gone from uncertain to impossible.

Sunday 10 January 2010

Let It Snow

It’s a bit embarrassing, but I was well chuffed when Boro’s game with Swansea fell victim to the ice (or ‘the big freeze’ as the media insist on calling it).

The last thing my football team needed right now was to play a game of football. Especially against Paulo Sousa’s improving Swans.

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This weekend's football programme was decimated by the weather

With Strachan’s scheme to change our home kit to green-and-white hoops taking longer than he hoped – not to mention Adam Johnson’s fresh injury lay-off – you can forgive Boro fans for feeling a tad relieved at the weekend off.

The rest of the chilly weather’s been a nightmare though, hasn’t it? I’ve been housebound all week because I’m scared of doing a Todd Carty down the garden path.

So, I thought, what better time to enjoy a week in front the telly? Unfortunately, there’s more of the white stuff on the box than there is outside my house. You can’t get away from it.

It’s all very well for kids, who seem the only section society enjoying the snap, sledging as they do along any section of road with a hint of an incline.

But for football fans across the country, it’s becoming tiresome. Match of the Day eked 60 minutes of highlights out of the Premier League’s two surviving games yesterday. I found myself flicking between that and the erotica on one of Channel 5's sister stations (pun very much intended). A remarkably sorry state of affairs.

Back to the Boro, and it really is important we make the most of the postponed fixture by strengthening the squad before a tough trip to Sheffield Utd next weekend.

It’s heartening to read that the boss is looking to bring in his Celtic comrades Gary Caldwell and Barry Robson. Both are tough lads who can add strength to our sometimes lightweight side.

I reserve full judgement on Willo Flood and Chris Killen, but from the bits and pieces I’ve seen of them they’re unlikely to transform the team overnight. Kris Boyd sounds like wishful thinking, while any move for Kevin Phillips will apparently have to wait until McLeish blows a bit of his £40m January kitty.

Still, it sounds like Strach is looking to make things happen and certainly has more room to manoeuvre now the unfancied midfield duo of Digard and Shawky are off the wage bill.

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A fitting tribute: Shawky gets nowhere near the ball

Keith Lamb might have driven the latter to Teesside Airport (does anyone call it Durham Tees Valley?) himself after a woeful couple of years at the Riverside.

But, even after his free transfer to Turkey, Shawky’s still managing to disappoint. I got a touch over-excited when I saw this article on the MFC homepage. Having clicked frantically to read which Brazilian international we were linked with, I felt a mite daft when I realised the picture was used because it had the duff-tackling Egytpian lurking behind the yellow shirt.

No. The days of samba stars like Juninho, Emerson, and, erm... Ricardinho, are over. Nowadays we can’t even lure Englebert of Humperdink to Teesside.

Monday 4 January 2010

Window Shopping

An important transfer window lies ahead for Boro and Gordon Strachan. The Christmas holiday weekend represented another false dawn to which the new boss has become synonymouse in his brief, faltering tenure.

Defeat at Barsley was a case of ‘typical Boro’ having brushed aside Scunny in a shock home win two days earlier.

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Strachan is under pressure after only 11 games in charge

The Scot’s arrival was supposed to ignite energy both inside the dressing room and through the turnstiles. But two months on, the champagne football lacking in Southgate’s Boro is yet to flow, while there’s more murder suspects on Albert Square than there are fans at the Riverside at the moment – until we diddle the figures, of course.

In fairness, though, this isn’t Strach’s squad. There’s plenty of deadwood left over from the Southgate regime which the Scot clearly doesn’t fancy. Marvin Emnes, for example, is struggling to get the nod ahead of a lad fresh from having kick-abouts at break time.

The likes of Grounds, Taylor, Shawky and Digard might also be up for the chop this transfer window, which would be a shame in the case of the latter, who has shown promise when fit.

Priority for Strachan has to be a striker. You know you’ve got limited options up front when you’re begging a club to lend you Marcus Bent for another couple of weeks.

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Marcus Bent celebrating a goal - no, really

Kitson might be worth having back, but only on loan. He’s likely to grab some goals if we create the chances, but he isn’t going to carve them out himself you feel.

In an ideal world, Gibbo would cough up the daft amount Leeds want for Man Utd-slaying hitman Jermaine Beckford. That’s if he’d come to us – at the moment, his League One club look a much more attractive prospect than bungling Boro.

Let’s hope Strachan has a few targets in mind. Because the current crop of players will get the club nowhere. And the manager’s honeymoon period – if there ever was one – is over. Not that he cares what I think.