THE AWAY END
SHEFFIELD UNITED v MIDDLESBROUGH
John Powls, 18 Jan 2010
The Build Up To The Game
The atmosphere on a lot of the websites earlier this last week was decidedly tetchy - a bit like the edginess caused by being cooped up with your relatives for just that bit too long over the Christmas break, extended by the snow.
The equation seemed to work out like this:- too much snow plus too little footy minus not enough signings yet plus Digard and Shawky gone, all divided by the constant of poor Boro form equals introspection and squabbling in the DiasBoro family.
It was all a bit like a Bergman film, leavened only by the feeling that the postponement of the Swansea game probably hadn't been a bad thing for Boro.
Column Continues Below...
There were suggestions that we could lighten things by running a book on quite how many Celtic players Strachan would sign in January and the highest number that will be speculated by the newspapers (highest punt - seven, so far - by NotW; 10 January).
As we got to midweek, things perked up as bit as what could have been four actually in from The Hoops became three. Gary Caldwell had 'done a Watson' and skedaddled from Crockliffe to Wigan as the lure of lucre and The Prem overcame his finer feelings for his old boss.
Not that I'm bothered you understand - what you've never had, you don't miss - but I hope it works out at Wigan for Caldwell just like it did for Watson and he ends up being shucked off to a lower division - like back to the Scottish Prem.
Boro were left with Barry Robson, Chris Killen and Willo Flood. What Phil and I have seen of Robson would indicate that he just may be the central midfielder we've been looking for for some time. We looked forward to seeing him play.
The jury was out on Flood and Killen. They've bench warmed for a lot of their time at Celtic and there's not much that's desperately encouraging about their career records either - particularly Killen's scoring record which puts him alongside the recent Boro standard in that role - i.e. not good enough.
But they were Boro Bhoys now and they had to have their chance to show that they can be better than some of the bench fodder and even first teamers that are currently or have very recently been at the club. Talking of which, two mostly invisible men departed - Digard for Nice and Shawky for Kayserispor (no, me neither).
So, there was added interest from this game in how many of the Boro Bhoys would debut in this game - from the start or from the bench - and whether Johnno would be risked, whether because he is in the departure lounge too or because of his hammy.
One who certainly wouldn't be was Mark Yeates. On Friday the curiosity was announced that The Blades and Boro had agreed a fee for him to move to Bramall Lane. He asked for the weekend to consider the move from warming the Boro bench to presumably doing the same at Sheffield and was dropped from the Boro squad.
A smaller Parmo Army than has recently been the case in relatively local away games took the Blades' fans rendition of their 'Chip Buttie' song with the expected derision.
The Game
The warm up told The Away End that we'd be seeing all three Boro Bhoys making their full debuts but an unexpected absentee was Rhys Williams.
The young Aussie was later said, variously - depending on who you listened to - to have 'picked up a knock in training' or 'not responded to an injection in his troublesome and chronic pelvic injury'.
Jezza partnered Killen up front and Isiah Osbourne also returned from injury in central midfield, though Johnno only made the bench.
What the warm up could tell the travelling Parmo Army was that the 'play everyone on the wrong wing' selections were in force from Strachan again.
This strange, non-delivering and foolish fad has become a bizarrely common 'Emperor's New Clothes' phenomenon amongst professional coaches recently - but mostly for wide midfield in a 4-4-2 or the wider front men in a 4-3-3.
The scales will, no doubt, fall from most people's eyes in due course but, in the meantime, Strachan seems to be making a fad into a fetish.
The reason he advanced on this occasion was about reducing the width - because that's where he believed his team would be most vulnerable - and making his team hard to beat.
Not only didn't the tactic ultimately work, of course, but couldn't he reason that Boro may be vulnerable out wide because they're playing with no width and square-pegged?
Equally, 'hard to beat' doesn't mean 'impossible to beat' and once Boro went a goal down being set up in the way he chose yesterday contributed significantly to the 'no way back' syndrome.
Tongue (only slightly) in cheek, Phil ventured that it only went to show how little regard Strachan must have for any of the left-footed left backs at the club that Tony McMahon retained his right back place against them!
At least some credit is due to the lately lashed together Boro side as Strachan's limited tactic worked in its limiting way - at least to start with. They successfully blunted The Blades in the first half of a game that was always going to be a tough ask. But this was only at the cost of any pretensions to winning the game themselves, lacking anything that could pretend to be a cutting edge.
Boro had only a couple of half-hearted attempts at goal that made Bunn disturb his reverie - and The Blades were even worse.
You could tell how bad it was when the home side - on the upwardly mobile run they are on and heading for their fifth home clean sheet in a row and the top six were booed off by their own fans at half-time. Drab would have been a compliment.
Blackwell's side weren't that much better in the second half either but Boro contrived to produce their usual mirror image second half - this time, the abject first half was the better! Not a single Boro attempt on target in the second half and even fewer altogether than the opening period.
And, yet again, once the Boro defence had been bamboozled by a straightforward cross early in the second half - Robson should have stopped the ball coming in Riggott got under it, Wheater got caught wrong side and Hoyte didn't back up - and allowed Cresswell to head home from short range, there was never going to be any way back.
'Every time we make a mistake we get punished for it' was Strachan's view of it. Not quite, Gordon mate, otherwise the margin of defeat would have been even greater.
So, three new faces but same old Boro.
So, not only did the midfield debutants have the usual issues of the recently arrived - and in the case of Flood, lack of game time - to cope with, they were on the wrong wings too.
We thought that Barry Robson showed enough to suggest that he can become a real asset - particularly if he's helped by being played in the centre of midfield as he has confirmed he strongly prefers or - at worst - wide left.
Willo Flood huffed and puffed but he still has a fair bit to do to show that he is any better than Mark Yeates who is about to be off-loaded, at a loss, to yesterday's opponents. And I have never thought that Yeates was good enough - even for this poor division.
The third Boro Bhoy debutant, Killen, looked like another in a long line of non-scoring Boro strikers but he worked hard. The World Cup may well provide some motivation for him to keep the effort up but he's surely not much more than a back up to someone a lot better that Boro still badly need.
His partner upfront at Bramall Lane, Jezza, is, at least consistent. He flattered to deceive, showed some promise but never finished the job. He then faded before getting injured. Comme d'habitude.
His best contribution was a 'seen them given, seen them denied' collapse under challenge in the box. That penalty shout was denied - but then so were the claims by The Blades for a ball that struck Robson's hand in the Boro box and a similar earlier version that involved Wheats.
When Johnno came on, up front for a tiring Killen, he showed like a diamond in a dung heap but his classy touches, on their own, weren't enough to influence the inevitable outcome and he couldn't conjure one of his DIY goals this time either.
Another weary trudge back to the buses, trains and cars for The Parmo Army.
Later
The result took The Blades into the play off places and Boro down to unlucky thirteenth and the bottom half of this poor division and, of course, widened the gap that The Reds will have to bridge to get into the play offs to six points.
You might very well ask quite how big this gap has to become, with games against sides above them - Donny, The Swans and The Robins - to come in the next few weeks, before Boro officially lose touch with even this last and outside chance. I couldn't possibly comment!
Strachan's post match comments captured some of the mood.
"It's not great fun, it's not nice, I wouldn't recommend it for anybody but you have to deal with it."
Yeah, you and us both, Gordon mate.
He also ventured the view that, "I know what has to be done and I have to change it." The phrase that comes after the 'and' would also be agreed across the DiasBoro but what there'd be less agreement on and certainly less evidence for is the phrase that precedes it.
His record of only two wins, three draws and six defeats from his eleven league games in charge is embarrassingly bad, whatever the legacy he inherited.
Key to his solution is bringing in more players and although he seems to hint that he wants to retain Gary O'Neil and Johnno, you have to wonder.
Even if the two stay, a decent centre back, a proper left back, a goalkeeper and at least one and probably two strikers are required. And even if those were available at the sort of fess and wages that MFC can now, apparently, afford and can be brought in it will be weeks before they settle effectively.
The BBC Football League Show had the Blades v Boro game as their Championship feature but so poor was the entertainment that it got shunted down the order below the League One game at Norwich. Steve Claridge's response to the cursory 'what's up with Boro' question was to verbally shrug his shoulders and ramble in a way that amounted to 'search me, Guv.'
The Sunday and Monday newspaper' reports barely mentioned that game and barely mentioned Boro within their scant few paragraphs. Who can blame them?
The Away End will return after the Donny game on 26 January.
