After a busy summer window, Middlesbrough looked to have assembled a very strong squad that could ‘smash the Championship’. Signings such as Britt Assombalonga and Martin Braithwaite greatly excited Boro fans as they looked to have finally found a solution to their goal scoring problems.
However, Middlesbrough’s season as a whole has been a poor one, filled with an identity crisis and poor displays both offensively and defensively. This has been most evident in the Reds last two games. Both of which were at home to Norwich and Brentford and both of which were extremely winnable. What happened instead though was Middlesbrough lost 1-0 to Norwich and drew 2-2 with, at the time, 20th place Brentford.
Despite this, there are still another 35 Championship games to play this season and although Middlesbrough find themselves in 11th place, they are only eight points behind league leaders Cardiff.
Therefore, while things are looking bad right now, there is plenty of time for Boro to turn their season around. But in order to do that several of Middlesbrough’s players need to start performing a lot better. Here are three players who need to improve in order for Middlesbrough to earn promotion this season.
Ben Gibson
Last season Ben Gibson was a bit of a hero for Middlesbrough and arguably their best player. He played every minute of Premier League football and captained them for much of the season. Gibson showed passion, leadership and was one of the main reason’s Boro had such a good defensive record for much of the season. His good performances last season even earned him a place in the England squad.
However, this season Gibson does not look half the player he was last year. He has still captained Boro for most of their games and has continued to play every minute of league football. But a lot of his performances have been subpar.
Gibson does not seem as confident as last season and has made several mistakes this season. For example, in Middlesbrough’s 3-2 win over QPR Gibson looked very poor. For QPR’s first goal it was somewhat Fabio’s fault. But Gibson could have easily stuck out a leg to prevent the ball being played to Fabio’s man in the first place. The second goal was a mix-up between Gibson and Randolph in which Gibson was waiting for Randolph to come out and clear it. While some blame could be put on the keeper, Gibson was more at fault as he had the ball and should have shown some intuition and leadership and just simply got rid of the ball rather than causing a nervy situation between centre back and keeper.
Ben Gibson has even been outshone by young centre-back Dael Fry for much of the season. This Shows Gibson isn’t at his best as a 20-year-old is quickly becoming many fans favoured centre back.
Gibson is primarily Middlesbrough’s captain and if he is underperforming it sets a bad precedent for the full team and also means Boro are conceding far too many goals. He needs to up his game now if he wants to remain as Middlesbrough’s main centre back.
Britt Assombalonga
Britt Assombalonga signed for Middlesbrough this summer for £15 million and is their record signing. As well as a hefty price tag Assombalonga also came with an excellent goalscoring record in the Championship. For instance, in the 2016/17 season, he scored 14 goals in 20 starts for relegation battling Nottingham Forest.
Therefore, when Boro signed him, they were expecting him to bag in the goals. That plan hasn’t worked out to great. Granted, he has scored five goals in the Championship this season, only three less than Boro’s top scorer managed in a full season last time they were promoted from the Championship. But he simply hasn’t been good enough.
He has missed some huge chances. The most notable game being when Boro lost 2-1 to Nottingham Forest. Assombalonga could not hit a barn door that day and it ultimately cost Middlesbrough the game.
He has also had another shocker in Boro’s defeat to Norwich. Yes, he did have once chance cleared off the line. But his overall play was very poor and he was struggling to even control balls that were played to him.
This is simply not good enough from the player who is supposed to be the source of Middlesbrough’s goals this season. He needs to start putting in consistently good performances rather than scoring a brace every once in a while and being useless the other 80% of the time.
Jonny Howson
Howson is another player brought in by Middlesbrough this summer that has not really lived up to expectations.
He has been brought into partner Adam Clayton at CDM. Clayton has been solid there this season and hasn’t done an awful lot wrong. Howson, on the other hand, has been very poor. He miss places passes, fails to get back quick enough and his general play hasn’t been great. The most recent example of this being in Boro’s last game vs Brentford.
Howson started and was largely responsible for Brentford scoring their second goal. It was his poor pass that gifted Brentford the possession to start the move that would lead to their second. Also, when Brentford got in the Boro box, their cross went straight past Howson who could have easily slid and put the ball out for a corner. Instead, he ball watched and the cross fell to Watkins who scored. This is just one example of the lazy poor displays Howson has put in so far this season.
Many people would prefer Grant Leadbitter to be the one partnering Clayton instead of Howson. But Monk clearly sees something in Howson as he has played in 10 of Middlesbrough’s 11 league games this season. Therefore, as Howson looks likely to remain a constant in the Boro team this season, he needs to up his game or Middlesbrough could drop more points because of him, like they did at Brentford.
