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THE FUTURE'S BRIGHT, THE FUTURE'S MOWBRAY 19-1-05
There's a very bright young manager making a big name for himself in Scotland at the moment and it would be well worth us Boro fans keeping an eye on this guy's progress.
If the pundits are correct and if popular opinion turns out to be right, then Steve McClaren will take up the England post when the truly awful Erikksson returns home defeated at the end of the 2006 World Cup.
I have previously stated my total opposition to this alleged course of events but lately, I have come to realise that we could probably live with the situation. If we had to. One look at the Scottish Premier League table tells you exactly why.
'Hibs fans are currently enjoying what is without doubt some of the best football produced at Easter Road for many years' is what The Scotsman newspaper said recently and record sales of season tickets this season at Easter Road appear to back that up.
The manager only joined the club in the Summer, succeeding Bobby Williamson who defected to Plymouth. After the success that has been brought to the club by the new man in the hot seat, I doubt very much whether Williamson is being missed by anyone at the club, despite his reasonable achievements.
Tony Mowbray was one of the group of outstanding young players who Malcolm Allison had in his squad when he was Boro boss. Despite instructions from the boardroom, Big Mal refused to sell any of them and was subsequently sacked.
Mogga went on to earn the moniker of Mr Middlesbrough and played a total of 345 league games for us between 1981 and 1991 and became one of our most distinguished and revered club captains.
Mogga was the man who led us out at Hartlepool in 1986 as the club was reborn and was also a mainstay during the successive promotions of 1987 and 1988. Somehow, we always felt safer when Tony was present in the back four.
Tony left the Boro for Celtic in 1991 for a milllion pounds, a reasonably high figure for a defender in those days and has since become a legendary figure in Glasgow, Ipswich and now Edinburgh.
He is the man credited with starting the famous 'Celtic huddle' and deserves much praise for his role in Ipswich Town's promotion to the Premier League not so long ago.
Bruce Rioch's famous quote will live on in Teesside folklore forever: "If you were on a rocket ship flying to the moon, the man you would want sitting next to you would be Tony Mowbray."
It is little wonder that he beat off some vastly experienced competition for the Hibs job and it is a testamant to his great work there that the directors are already publicly talking about an extension to the two year contract that he signed a mere six months ago.
So will the story turn full circle for Tony Mowbray and is his career path leading straight back home to Middlesbrough? Only time will tell and as a club who have no tradition of making sentimental appointments of managers with local pedigree, there is no guarantee that Tony will be Steve McClaren's successor.
However, after the impact that Mogga has made in Edinburgh and the fact that his heart always was and hopefully always will be rooted firmly in the streets of Middlesbrough, what better bet could there be than a famous return home for an old favourite who is proving that he can mix it at the top level.
Apparently, Keith Lamb recently stated that the club are 'monitoring the situation'...
There is a rumour doing the rounds at the moment that Boro are trying to sign Hibernian captain Ian Miller. We'll probably never know if any promises or 'incentives' are to be built into any deal that may transpire but perhaps these transfer negotiations will have some bearing on what may or may not happen in the future where Tony Mowbray is concerned.
I wonder how Tony would handle himself in front of the FA's disciplinary committee? After the old farts' recent summoning of Steve McClaren for his pitch incursion at White Hart Lane, Boro must now appear again, this time to answer charges relating to Sunday's goalmouth fight with Everton.
We're up in front of the committee in early February and whatever is said behind those closed doors, we will probably get a fine that will be in the region of around £20,000, which is equivalent to the admission fee paid by around 650 supporters at Sunday's game.
If my estimation is correct, then it will also be around half of the figure that the Spanish authorities were fined for the racist abuse inflicted on the England team by their animal supporters. In other words, it will be an injustice, whatever happens.
Middlesbrough Football Club take around £800,000 to £1,000,000 from ticket sales every home game and then there is merchandise and refreshments on top of that.
So if the FA think that a fine of roughly 2% of a match gate, or half of Mark Viduka's weekly wage if you prefer, is going to go any way towards stopping any team defending one of their comrades when required to do so, then they are proving themselves to be the deluded and out of touch incompetent fools that I always believed them to be.
What happens to the money when a club is fined by these stupid amounts? Are any figures ever released? Are there any accounts available to show what good use they put these proceeds to? Probably not.
And are the FA within their moral bounds to censure a club financially for breaking rules that these self appointed 'guardian angels of football law and order' have inflicted upon the game?
I'm not saying that fighting during a match should be allowed, although I wouldn't protest too loudly if the rules were altered to include the odd barney here and there.
What I'm saying is that the FA like to portray themselves as a moralistic organisation who frown upon any wrongdoing that takes place within the game.
Yet it is morally wrong to be fining clubs or players because they were involved in a situation that the FA would struggle to understand the dynamics of.
The game would easily be able to continue and thrive without the FA but the FA would die overnight if the clubs suddenly refused to accept their authority. Boro and Everton have got a great opportunity here to make a stand and undermime the FA by not accepting any punishment given to them.
If all the clubs were to support the two mutineers, the FA would be finished and a governing organisation made up of real football people could take it's place. Maybe if this unlikely scenario were to happen, there would be a future for English football at a national level?
But at least the future of Boro is secure. We have Tony Mowbray waiting in the wings...
Until next week.
Steve
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