Boro it appears are now looking for a miracle to maintain their Premier League status as we contemplate at Easter our seemingly entombed position at the depths of the table – talk is about needing four or five wins but the doubting Thomas’s out there will point to the simple fact Boro have not managed a single top-flight victory since before Christmas.
The strikers have been stigmatised for their lack of goals – Boro have failed to score in more than half of their games this season – which has even resulted in being declared the second most boring team in the history of the Premier League. Aitor Karanka may have had his disciples among the faithful but his failure to avoid being tempted by the cautious ways of the Red Devil’s manger ultimately lead many to believe he was no longer the Messiah to keep Boro in the promised land.
Boro supporters are now contemplating a return to the wilderness of the Championship and after waiting seven long years to escape the last footballing famine it’s going to be a heavy cross to bear. OK it’s still not a forgone conclusion – and Saturday’s results have kept a flicker of hope alive – but among the hardened cynical old men of Teesside whistling ‘always look on the bright side of life’ is not usually a tune that is part of their Riverside repertoire.
Whilst results have continued to disappoint there has been somewhat of a fresh approach by Steve Agnew’s new coaching setup. As the anointed successor he has probably been handed something of a poison chalice by Steve Gibson, as he’s not only had to pick up the players, but has been hit with a defensive injury crisis at the very moment he’s been tasked with making the team more progressive.
Though what we have seen is that Agnew is not attached to a particular system and has been quite pragmatic with his tactics. In his four games he’s tried to shuffle his resources and despite two nil-nil’s, there definitely has been more attacking intent on display. He’s even managed to get an off-the-pace deemed Bamford looking close to his old self in a matter of a few weeks.
Though if Boro are going to have any chance to resurrect their season then they are going to need the key players to show their best form – and preferably at the same time. Negredo needs to play more like a striker – though getting onto to crosses has not been remotely a nailed-on scenario for him this season – he’s been for much of this term starved of service so that stoic fasting rather than a feast of goals has been the order of the day. Though he’s not blameless and has often been guilty of not getting into centre-forward positions after the opportunities to score fail to materialise – however, he did look dangerous when he came off the bench against Burnley.
So Boro welcome a rather porous Arsenal side to the Riverside who have lost their last four games on the road in the Premier League, conceding three goals in each of those defeats. Whether Boro can further upset an embattled Arsene Wenger, who continues to contemplate his future, by making that five away defeats on the spin may pretty much decide both our fates. With two games in hand on Hull it would give the theoretic opportunity (as until the first win arrives I class multiple victories as nothing more than a mathematical exercise) to overhaul them on goal difference if three points at home to Sunderland can be also bagged.
There is good news on the injury front as Friend’s sacred calf has at last been healed and Fabio’s three-game concussion break has finally been knocked on the head. With Ayala looking better with every game it gives the prospect of a return to a more solid and mobile back line. Also Gaston Ramirez has shaken off his ankle injury so in theory will be contemplating putting in a long-awaited performance for any scouts accidentally sitting in front of the TV.
There has been talk of continuing with a 3-5-2 formation as the way forward – personally, I don’t think Boro have the midfield players to make that formation work effectively as it essentially means three centre-backs matched with three defensive midfielders – admittedly Boro looked more solid and did try to get forward but actually created very little real attacking threat until the substitutions came on against Burnley. So if Boro decide against a back four, I think 3-4-3 may be a better option (or variations of) in order to have more attack-minded players on the pitch. Perhaps a front three of Gaston, Negredo and Adama would worry the Gunners defence more than other permutations would.
OK time to put all your chocolate eggs in one basket and contemplate your predictions – will Monday be the start of an Easter rising up the table? or will Boro freeze like an Easter bunny caught in the headlights of expectation? As usual give your thoughts on the score and scorers – plus will Arsene Wenger’s failing eyesight fail to see a Boro nailed-on penalty along with the Ref.
I’m going for a celestial 1 0 to Boro to resurrect our season.
Our relegation is not set in stone let’s roll it back to winning ways and be reborn as a Premiership club
I tweeted it and very promptly was picked up by Arsenal fans and retweeted
Well done Werder
From “No surrender” on the last blog to “Easter rising” on this one and no Platt, Cochrane, Kernaghan, McMordie or even a Bernie in sight!
Lets hope for both tomorrow night. I have a gut feeling something is going to break in our favour soon. Maybe not enough and maybe too little too late but there have been signs of improvement and its going to click very soon.
RR
I’ll be spending some time with Platty tomorrow evening let’s hope that it’s a good omen for a win
I remember watching Platty play for Ballymena against Glentoran at the Oval in Belfast just before he joined Boro, he must have been about 18 or so at the time. The Oval was normally one of the best pitches in the Irish League but on this day it was like a bog and the players were literally caked in mud to the extent that it was becoming hard to make out who was who in some cases.
Albert Finlay was in Goal for Glentoran and Platty for Ballymena of whom great things were expected at the time. I would have been around 9 years old but I remember that Platty’s Ballymena Goalkeeping shirt was a pale washed out looking yellow whilst Finlay’s was a deeper golden yellow. After half time both Keepers came out in the Glentoran deeper shade of golden yellow so I assumed that Glentoran had lent him a clean shirt or maybe the Ballymena kit man was keeping their Sunday best Goalkeepers Jersey for a big game.
My recollection of the days events could be completely skewed over the decades but its one of those bizarre footballing events that for some reason just sticks in your mind made all the more bizarre that I can’t recall who won or even the score that day. It must have been only months later that he joined Boro.
I’ll mention that to him tonight
BTW he is on Facebook and always chats to fans if you want to sign up to his account
Fat Bob
RR
I spoke to Platty and he doesn’t remember it
He said he was always borrowing shirts from someone!
Fat Bob
The foam fumes are still rising, so I am going for a 3-1 win to us. I cannot wait for this one. Negredo brace, Traore assisting both and Traore scoring the third. UTB.
Acklam, I can smell the foam fumes even here in Finland – and it is blowing from the North in here.
I am praying for a Boro win. 1-0 win with Ayala would be excelent. Not likely though but we are due some luck and a result.
Up the Boro!
Arsenal to win. More details when I know the team.
To quote the great MP he’s not the messiah he’s a naughty boy…. Think we need more than a miracle
The trouble with all these top four sides is that they have an inbuilt sense of rights and privileges, so, after being beaten by some nameless team( not on the top four, nuff said) they will have endured the most frightful, in order, bollocking, inquest, interview with the club shrink, enquiry as to their worth or indeed right to call themselves a professional footballer, followed by the offer of the number of a good agent.
So it will be tough.
Always look on the bright side of life. De dum, de dum, de dum.
Boro 0 – 2 Arsenal.
All together,
Poor old Negredo, but what a great tattoo!
UTB,
John
Fantastic article Weder, loved all the Easter word plays!
The results on Saturday certainly went in our way and with 2 games in hand, two wins would see us out of the bottom three.
So miracles can happen and maybe Boro can rise from the dead and stay in the promised land. However, it is probably going to a lot of faith hope and charity!
Tomorrow, won’t be easy and I am hoping that we can stop the Gunners firepower and fire the first salvos towards survival. Let’s hope we have enough ammunition available.
So I am going for a hard fought battle which will see Boro winning 1 0 wiyh Bamford firing home in the 90 minute
Team – who knows!
UTB
Arsenals bad run comes to an end and so does Boros last chance of escape.
Sorry lads, Boro 0 Them Lot 2
Planning for the Championship starts now.
Great stuff and this is certainly Boro’s chance to rise from the dead and get our teeth into somebody. Let’s hope that Wenger isn’t a Buffy fan.
For me 3-5-2 and 3-4-3 are variations of a similar idea. Will 3-4-3 give us enough bodies in the middle to pack the midfield early on and make it too hard for Arsenal to play their pretty stuff. If so, it certainly gives us the chance to push forward. Arsenal always leave room behind their full backs.
I have to be optimistic – although with no strong conviction – and am going for a 2-0 win sealed late on by Traore finally getting a goal. First goal nailed on for Negredo.
UTB .
Today is a chance to finally see what Agnew can do with the team, as working out whether he is the man to take us forwards is Steve Gibson’s biggest challenge now. Agnew has had time to work with the players and has close to the strongest fit squad he could have to choose from. No need to adapt the formation to allow for injuries, or to try to force wins in games we could not afford to lose against close rivals. Obviously Arsenal have the players to cut though us if the game is too open, but let’s get in their face and see if we can create some chances and if some situations fall kindly for us.
Interesting to read Jono’s piece about the time we have wasted in getting Patrick Bamford up to speed. One of the most astonishing moments of AK’s press conferences as things unravelled was for him to say that Bamford could play for the U23’s ‘if he wants to’ – for a manager who wanted to control everything, it was his responsibility to put Patrick into those games and get him sharper and fitter.
Meanwhile, I hope that behind the scenes the scouting work goes on of identifying some very strong and effective Championship performers we could pursue in the summer. I would hope also we are trawling League One for dominant players there who are ready to come into the Championship and make an impact. We still have to plan in recognition of the high likelihood of Championship football next season.
At bottom our default problem(and it will not go away) is awful recruitment, characterised by a completely empty headed approach.
We follow none of the rules which have served as a yardstick for plenty of other clubs over the years.
For example, who is the best young striker in the first division? Or defender?
Who is the best young striker in the none league pyramid? Or defender?
I do not believe for one moment that the club have a clue about the above, but these players are there to be bought( as a side issue, many years ago I was watching Portsmouth as an impartial visitor to the city, and who should be playing but a young, incredibly thin, incredibly tall, incredibly awkward Peter Crouch, he was so unlikely as a potential footballer that I started watching him and ignoring the rest of the match, and realised that he was very good indeed. So there are bargains out there.
Our method, which seems to consist of buying players which a big club is eager to sell, is fatal, as these clubs are very good in their judgement of players, and in any case, if the player in question was any good they would sell him to their mates.
Or Plato, if the player was any good they would not sell them at all.
i accept as Ian has pointed out on numerous occasions, we are towards the bottom of the food chain, depending which league we are in. However as you and Boronurk have said our scouting department has been rubbish at finding lower league players with potential.
Oh yes they can find plenty of “Projects” at relatively high prices that have generally failed, but a “little gem” from the lower regions…..no chance.
In fact I would say that Orta, Gill and the rest of the scouting set up should have their positions seriously considered. How many really good buys have they identified and brought us? Answers on a postcard.
Pedro
The big clubs are selling machines, Chelsea have about 84 youths out on loan all over the shop, 80 of these will be sold, eventually. Someone will buy them because they will not be given away, strangely, any good ones will end up at clubs which are in the magic circle, the rest will end up with the usual targets(us, anyone?)
BTW, does someone know why the Boro vs Arsenal match is played so late? I know it is on TV in the UK, but why not at 15:00 h as it is a holiday today?
Up the Boro!
Jarkko
Its Sky TV’s MNF slot (Monday Night Football). Surprised that they selected the Boro game even though its against Arsenal. I guess they looked at the fixtures for the weekend and the TV’s companies picked their favourites for Easter Sunday and Saturday and then Boro v Arsenal was the best of the rest.
Jarkko. There is a full programme of Championship and Division 1 and 2 matches where attendances might be affected if a televised match kicked off at the same time.
Cheers for the replies, mates.
We are two hours in front so the match starts at 22:00. But I should not complain as there are Boro fans who have a bigger time difference!
So three Boro fans at our house (me son stays overnight to see the match, too). I hope the match is worth it.
Up the Boro!
Obviously not sadly Jarkko! We tried hard but lack of quality that even Crystal Palace and WBA have and being the lowest scorers in all divisions out of 92 clubs tells you which way we’re heading!
Pedro
You wont need the postcard, there is enough space on the back of the stamp.
My son and daughter were home over the Easter weekend and they duly left fully fed an watered but we spent plenty of time talking about the match. Arsenal fans are really concerned it, unbelievable Jeff!
Logic says the Gunners can’t be so lily livered for much longer. Head says an away win, heart says just maybe points from an unexpected source. The bookies have Arsenal at 8/15 with us at 5/1.
Arsenal have only won 3 out of their last 9 games against Boro and they are bickering and finger pointing furiously!
Nice one Werder. You can’t beat a bit of blasphemy at Easter. An Easter Monday win really would bring us back from the dead.
We have a chance, but the sure fire way of giving the game away, as boronurk suggests, would be to go all out to attack, make it an open game , and make it easy for Arsenal to pick us off on the counter. They would love that.
I agree with the consensus. Keep it tight, get in their faces, close them down, deny them space, make sure that we are still in the game after an hour, and then apply attacking pressure spurred on by the crowd.
That approach would be much closer to the AK formula than the kind of “attacking” play we saw against Hull. If we leave ourselves exposed to an early Arsenal goal and have to chase the game, that would suit the Gunners down to the ground. In spite of their lapse in form they are still one of the best teams anywhere if they have the space in which to play.
1-0 to Boro if the tactics are right.
0-4 to Arsenal if they aren’t.
I’d like to think that we could sneak it but, as Len and others have said, we’ve got to play the AK game. If they score first, it will most likely be the 0-4 option and goodnight Vienna, just as the maths were giving us hope of a miraculous escape.
UTB
Len
Totally agree, as I posted previously Arsene wants teams to play football the ‘right way’. In other words play two upfront so his five in midfield cut us to pieces.
Palace thrashed them with under 30% possession.
PS
It is announced Terry will leave Chelsea in the summer – that is an opening for Ben whether you like Chelsea or not.
Great read and graphics Werder
Hoping for another Easter miracle and we rise up the table and escape relegation.
Win tonight and I might start believing. Recent results mean destiny is in our own hands once again even though it’s a tough ask.
Stranger things have happened and teams miraculously escape relegation just as much as a team that looks safe plummets unexpectedly to relegation.
Narrow 1.0 win or a 3.0 hammering from me sitting on the fence
433
3 defensive midfielders.
Guzan in goal.
And Arsenal break their losing streak.
I think SA has picked three In MF to keep it tight from the off. Could not pick Friend who has not played since…..when?
We have to hope that Gaston is up for it. Show other clubs he can compete with the best.
Normally I do not do predictions, however Bamford to slot in the winner in the 85th.
Defensive set up by Agnew so 3-1 to the Gunners and farewell EPL.
Boro exile
All I will say is that go out gung hoe against the Gunners and it would be a cricket score and it would ruin goal difference and not ours!!!
Unless you do not actually follow football or knee jerk you should know that playing open is a recipe for disaster unless you are someone like Barcelona.
I am not normally so rude to posters but sorry, the players Arsenal have are too good for most teams if you let them play.
Ian,
Did I say that they should go hung ho? Did I say that they should play open?
I said it was a defensive set up and as a result Arsenal were allowed a lot of the ball. As you say they have good players so we lost as I predicted.
Anyway
Not many chances for Arsenal and they lead 1-0.
Such is life in the top flight, just too good. Compare the pitifull effort from Grant.
Half-time. Knocks and injuries have made it difficult for us now. We’ve already used one sub and Leads is carrying a hammy, and seems unlikely to finish the game. We need Traore and Gestede on as a matter of urgency, and the attractive option of Bamford won’t now be available. But bring the subs on early and an injury will mean we finish the game with 10 men. Desperate times, and another goal against will finish us. But we need two up front.
Tonight summed it up really. Everyone has beaten Arsenal. We have little quality in our side and sadly hard work, effort et al don’t make up for it.
We should and possibly could have won, and after all, if Crystal Palace and WBA can hump the Arse then it shows where we are as a club.
The lowest scorers out of 92 league clubs deserve to be relegated, end of…
Well as has been said before hope kills you, at the end of the day we aren’t good enough. Don’t understand why lots of us get so excited about Adama, yes he runs fast but footballing wise he is clueless. One good run tonight spent rest of the time wandering around like a lost soul.
We tried tonight and had a couple of chances other than the goal, we lack the prerequisite skil/footballing craft to survive in this league.
Arsenal didn’t have that many real chances but they have extra something that is needed.
In my opinion SA is not the answer as manager but who is, now that is the 64000 dollar question.
Couldn’t fault us tonight for effort and commitment (Barragan apart) but in the end we just haven’t got the kind of quality that the £75 million that bought Ozil and Sanchez brought to Arsenal. Not much that we can do about that, even if we had managed to spend the money we do have more prudently.
That’s been the story of our season. We haven’t been short of effort and spirit, and we have produced some good and invariably well-organised performances. I’m probably in a minority in believing that we have played better this season than we did last, when only at Ipswich and Brighton, and at home to Derby and perhaps Brentford did we show Premier League quality. This term we held our own in most games up until Christmas. But our lack of creative midfield quality- evident for the past 3 years – has finally caught up with us.
Can they just relegate us now, so we can forget this miserable season and start from scratch in the summer?
Unlike Jesus, we will not be rising from the dead. Can’t fault the effort but the reality is we are not good enough. Len sums it up in his post.
Yes, as others have said we huffed and puffed but a real dearth in quality in key areas has meant that games against the better sides have usually been settled by a bit of quality and inevitably it comes from the opposition. No wins against any of the top 16 clubs in the league tells its own story. Funnily enough I felt the area we looked must out of depth tonight was central midfield. Both Clayton and leadbitter for all their endeavours just do not look premiership class. Their ball retention at this level is really poor and for arsenal’s second goal leadbitter just left his man.
I feel for Steve Agnew. How can we judge him? He’s taken on a job with a demoralised team who were so ingrained in the defensive arts it was always going to be extremely difficult to change the mentality. Couple that with the difficult games we have left to play. However, despite all the difficulties in judging him accurately, judge him we must, and for me if we’re in the championship making him the permanent manager is too much of a risk. We need a manager who has proven himself and a manager who may have to sell Gibson for 30 million and then be able to reinvest that money to rebuild a promotion challenging team from what will probably be a depleted squad.
Can we trust a novice to do that? I wouldn’t want to.
I would rather trust a novice than our current “recruitment” department! At least a novice may strike lucky and get one right. We could have say £50m plus to spend on building a new team especially if Ben goes.
I wouldn’t spend a penny of it until I found out why we bought who we did and how the finances were structured or perhaps more importantly who got paid what, by whom, why and what were the connections? Either something stinks or an entire department is grossly incompetent.
Wonder how much Adomah, Rhodes, Reach, Nsue and Nugent would cost us?
Paul. I agree, I’m afraid.
At the start of the game and up until they scored, I felt positive, there was some attacking intent in the line up although by half time, I was sort of resigned. However, for a period after we equalised, I felt that we could maybe nick it, but the second killed up off.
Paul does sum it up, there were basic errors and Adama looked lost at times (maybe missing being told what to do every 5 second Seconds). The marking for the second goal was poor although we did try after that although a draw wouldn’t do. I kept hoping for a Steau like come back………….
So we are 6 points adrift with 7 to play and requiring Probably at least 14 points, in the EPL with Chelsea Liverpool and Man City to play. At the start of last season we said 2 points a game average and promotion so realistically can I see it between now and 21 May. Much as it hurts from someone who always hopes, I don’t thinks so somehow, it wil need a bigger miracle than Jesus managed At Easter ( and, no, I don’t believe in that story)for that to happen.
We need to plan for the future now and see what the understudies are made off so assessments can be made on who we need next year.
As we were saying after the game, a bit different from this time last year and I concur with Teapot, put us out of our misery as the hope kills!
I like the two points per game target. It tells clearly where we are now and the target is easy to follow. But very unlikely to happen, though.
Up the Boro!
Before anyone else picks up on it, 6 to play, 14 from six, o well, the odds just increased! Daft pound anybody?
Above all the talk of players, their form and so on, looms the fact that we have suffered and are still suffering from the most awful management that I can recall in many years. It is obvious that the present incumbent was a fully paid up member of the AK team, his wildly eccentric team selections are getting worse not better.
Time to go through them(some at least)
Lets start with our central defenders, Gibson(at one point they were softening us up for moving him to full back)
Ayala, spent the beginning of the season telling us he was unfit(the injury was unknown) the more we got beat the more remote and unmentionable he became, goodby AK, still no Ayala, then, like magic he was in the team, hmm.
We, whether by luck or good judgement had one of the best pairs of fullbacks in the league, we suffered the tortures of the damned when they were both out injured. Cue last night, they were both fit for the visit of Arsenal. Our inglorious manager left one on the bench and played the other out of position at left back(as you might imagine he was crocked and the other one came on after ten minutes)
We have had a gaping hole at right back, no secret, Barragan should not have been on the pitch in any of the last six games, we could have played young Fry in the centre with Gibson and changed the fullback
Traore, hmm, we do not start him, then we give him the ball so that we can watch him beat four players(and watch is what we do, no one approaches him, perhaps they like to see a good dribbler) his place is in the front three and he should not have to dribble anyone, just chase the ball. By the way to say that he could have had a good chance of a goal when he first came on the pitch and made a good angle for a shot into the far corner is true, but why wasn’t that sorted out on the training pitch(its known as practice)
Our keeper, who has organised his escape, is worthless, I must assume that no one took him to one side and told him to stand in the middle of his goal at free kicks(because he did this to us before, with the same result, even his team mates should have ordered him to stand central, that way the taker has to choose, it ain’t brain surgery)
Bamford? Interesting one, bought by us, selected by us, our manager was part of the set up that did the deed, he came closest to getting us three points (Burnley) so why the picking of players who haven’t a clue in front of him ?
the substitutes cost us the game, sorry, but it is this side of the game that makes or breaks a boss, until then we were likely to finish it, after, it was them.