Back In Time Special: Did The Sale Of Emerson In 1997-98 Make That Much Of A Difference?

In January, The Teesside Gazette's Eric Paylor named a certain curly-haired star as one of the contenders for Boro's Greatest Ever Player. The third of Boro's three famous "Samba Kings" (although Branco was king in size only), Emerson was described as the kind who would (take) to the pitch like a powerhouse, dominate games from start to finish and leave us all gobsmacked.

At the time, I concurred, commenting that he was the perfect midfielder, an anchorman, playmaker, destroyer and match-winner rolled into one... on his day.

Therein lay the problem. Building the team around him during a season when his off-days were more likely than his on-days was never going to be healthy. It's documented that his move to Tenerife came about because of his off-field activities, but it's also been said that the best of Emerson's league form for Boro deserted him after his troublesome trip home to Brazil. This is simply not the case.

Eyebrows were raised when, for whatever reason, Emerson chose to commit himself to Boro when we were relegated in 1997, even though Juninho and Fabrizio Ravanelli would soon depart. Yet it would appear that Ravanelli's move away enabled both Paul Merson and Emerson to find both form and an understanding. With the moody, broody White Feather gone, back came the defence splitting passes, thunderous blockbusters and the kind of energy we had only seen in fits and starts from the trip to Rio onwards.

Still etched in the memory are his superb through ball for Merson away to Ipswich, his deadlock-breaking drive in Boro's first ever match at the Stadium Of Light from a Merson pull-back, and a full-hearted farewell display at home to Reading that prompted a flood of Christmas cards from Boro fans wanting him to stay.

He had that knack of popping up at the right place at the right time to give Boro the extra element of magic they needed to truly look a class above their opponents. Essentially, he did in half a season what Fabio Rochemback did in one match – delivering the goods at the very moment we were resigned to him hopping off.

And when he got ready to hop off, in December 1997, Boro initially found it hard to adjust, losing 2-0 at then-struggling Manchester City before entering one of their more laboured phases of 1997-98. The loss of a maverick unreliable had robbed us of a creative edge and made the season more problematic. But had it really?

With Emerson in the squad, Boro's record was: 13 wins, 6 draws and 3 defeats, with 39 goals scored and 17 conceded.

Without him, Boro's record was: 14 wins, 4 draws and 6 defeats, with 38 goals scored and 24 conceded.

The difference is minute: 45 points vs. 46 points with one extra game played. That also includes a relatively bad period for Boro in March and early April 1998, which saw the team take just seven points from seven games and suffer four league defeats in five away matches.

Among those defeats was a truly bizarre nine-goal leakage in the first week of March which saw 4-0 and 5-0 losses to Nottingham Forest and QPR respectively.

The presence of Andy Dibble in goal for those two games was symptomatic of one of Boro's real failings during the Bryan Robson years: poor decisions at the wrong times. Dibble played like the temporary stop gap he ultimately was; he looked unreliable despite making a number of fine saves.

Talent and squad depth are all very well, but where a club finishes also has much to do with attitude, organisation and choices.

That seemed especially true back then, where rotation and over-complication were less a trend and more a rarity. Essentially, if you had a strong spine, the right amount of match-winners and a dependable, classy strike force, you were all but guaranteed the right result.

Nottingham Forest had just that with Pierre Van Hooijdonk and Kevin Campbell, ditto Sunderland, with Niall Quinn and Kevin Phillips. Boro had... well... Merson, and whatever forward was in form enough to play with him. Nowadays, of course, Boro rotate their forwards regularly, but the mid-to-late 1990s were a different decade.

And at times, unfortunately, egotism and misguided tactics would trump sense and sensibility during the second half of 1997-98.

What was the true purpose of Robbo signing a fading Paul Gascoigne so close to both the League Cup final and the crucial end of the season, apart from to try and maintain a big club image by signing a big name player?

It had a slightly destabilising effect, and dependable midfield heroes like Neil Maddison and Craig Hignett had proven more than capable of magic moments themselves. Particularly Hignett, who was dropped from the cup final squad and was soon to leave Boro altogether.

The possibility that Robbo was dealt an unlucky hand with Emerson leaving and Mikkel Beck's loss of form doesn't wash with the money he spent and the match-winning skills of Madhouse, Higgy, Merse, Marco Branca and Alun Armstrong.

One suspects Robbo was exceptionally grateful – as we were – when future Irish international hero Matt Holland inspired Ipswich to the 2-0 win over Sunderland that handed promotion to Boro.

Of course Emerson's departure made a difference, but it was hardly a serious one. Saying it was so would be unjust on the men who bravely saw Boro over the finish line, albeit a little later and less comfortably than we hoped. No, it wasn't easy, but whatever is with Boro?

Originally published online at Gazette Live on February 2, 2015. Read more...

Back In Time: Middlesbrough 0, Aston Villa 4, 1999/2000 - "The Valentine's Day Massacre"

It was one of my darkest days as a Boro fan; a game that arguably signalled that the Robson Revolution could go no further.

Prior to the match, a faltering Boro had sunk to new depths, taking just one point from fifteen in a dreadful run that admittedly included a commendable draw at Anfield and a narrow defeat at Old Trafford more famous for the inexcusable behaviour of the Manchester United players than any penalty miss or goalkeeping error.

On the flip side, we'd tamely surrendered 4-1 at Derby in our last home game, allowing a then unknown future Boro striker named Malcolm Christie to steal the limelight.

Few, if any, exciting new stars had arrived or were coming through the ranks.

We had the absence of first choice goalkeeper Mark Schwarzer, injuries to Brian Deane, Robbie Mustoe & Steve Vickers, and the suspension of key men, Hamilton Ricard and Christian Ziege, to deal with.

And now we were up against a good, professional side containing one past and *five* future Boro men - Paul Merson, Ugo Ehiogu, Gareth Southgate, George Boateng, Benito Carbone and Alan Wright. (Okay, the last one is clearly best forgotten about.)

Bryan Robson seemed at his wits end, and sent out what looked like a poorly-thought-through starting eleven.

Colin Cooper at left-back? Keith O'Neill, a winger, up front with Andy Campbell when a natural front man, Alun Armstrong, was wasting away on the bench? A volatile, enigmatic and clearly past-his-best Paul Gascoigne making his first start in two months?

It felt bad. It *was* bad. We just didn't anticipate how bad it was going to get.

Not surprisingly, we had no threat up front. Even more surprisingly, we carried virtually no threat in midfield, unless you count Gascoigne's elbow in Boateng's face. (How ironic that Gazza ended his Boro career by whacking a player who would be so much more of a Boro midfield totem than Gazza ever was.)

But, worse than that, Villa really did win a canter. They always looked like they had something extra in the tank, and even with a one-goal lead, never truly looked in danger.

Little wonder that Colin Cooper was almost in tears as he faced the Sky cameras. He surely wasn't the only one.

A side as uninspired and incohesive as Robson's that night were always going to be extremely vulnerable against a team like Aston Villa.

And although we went on to lose just twice more for the remainder of the season and finish comfortably in mid-table with 52 points (our second highest ever Premier League tally, just behind 2004-05) and six away wins (a Premier League record that Boro have repeatedly come close to matching, but never bettering), it was more from pluck than flair.

It was hardly the kind of football that would attract the right kind of big names to the club, or encourage key players to stay.

Recall the imminent arrival of the temperamental Christian Karembeu and the criminally overpaid, mostly disinterested Alen Boksic. And a very messy transfer saga involving our newly found German international hero was about to erupt...

(Originally published online at the Evening Gazette on February 14, 2014.) Read more...

Back In Time: Middlesbrough 6, Derby County 1, 1996-97

Boro's 6-1 victory over Derby County in March 1997 was a rather deceptive match. It's not that the victory wasn't deserved - it was. It's not that it wasn't Boro's biggest league win of the season - it was. It's not that it didn't feature Fabrizio Ravanelli's third Boro hat-trick - it did.

It's just that it's very easy to look back at the scoreline, the attendance - wow, a full Riverside! - and the foreign legion and think, what a magnificent occasion! Except it wasn't really.

In the run up to Ravanelli's first and second Boro hat-tricks, against Liverpool and Hereford respectively, Boro had marched into the matches on a tidal wave of optimism, created firstly by the summer signings and secondly by three successive league victories. By the time we faced Derby, there were only twelve league games left and two gruelling cup runs had taken their toll on a rather shallow squad. Worse still, we were five points adrift at the bottom of the Premiership. "Bottomsbrough", indeed.

The signs of improvement we had shown since the deduction of those three points, in a 4-2 win over Sheffield Wednesday, a 1-1 draw with Wimbledon and an extremely unlucky 1-0 defeat against Newcastle were undone by, in Bryan Robson's words, a return to the "bad old ways" in a 3-1 defeat to Sheffield Wednesday at Hillsborough. Although Robbo had really not helped himself by reverting to his own "bad old" five at the back tactic in place of the more solid 4-4-2 that had proved to be much more effective.

At the time, I was willing to write off the match against Derby as another defeat before it had even begun. To me, even the arrival of Gianluca Festa and a young Mark Schwarzer had been falsely promising; the way Boro had played at Hillsborough on March 1, I was convinced that they could lose to anybody. Three wonderful weeks and four league victories later, Boro's season was transformed. And this was the game that kicked it off.

The win over Derby - Ravanelli's future club in addition to then future Boro boss Steve McClaren's current club (he was Rams boss Jim Smith's assistant manager before joining Big Nose at the Theatre Of Dreams in 1999) - was one of those games that showed you how any big win, regardless of how well the team plays on the day, can psychologically rally round a team and get them performing again. We weren't amazing here; Derby could have been at least two up in the first twenty minutes either side of Ravanelli's missed sitter, before popular Slovak Vladimir Kinder fired us ahead with a long-range effort that deceived Derby goalkeeper Russell Hoult.

The match was arguably a game of two goalkeepers, with Schwarzer's frame denying Dean Sturridge an equaliser minutes before Ravanelli's shot was helped into his own net by Hoult. If Schwarzer's presence was inspiring Boro, Hoult's was doing the exact opposite for Derby. The goalkeeper who had been so imperious when we'd faced him at the Baseball Ground in November 1996 had suddenly developed a severe case of the butterfingers. He trembled as both Craig Hignett and Mikkel Beck calmly stroked the ball past him, and handed Ravanelli's second goal to him on a plate before being rounded by The White Feather for the Italian's third goal - and Boro's sixth. Although to be fair to Hoult, the charity offered by the Derby defence to Boro's attack in the last ten minutes was more than a little shocking. It was as if they'd switched off following Hignett's goal, only coming to life again when Paul Simpson took the chance to deny Schwarzer a clean sheet with a stunning free kick.

It was hardly a model performance, but it was still a vital confidence boost that would set us in good stead to make progress in both cups and creep out of the relegation zone. Of course, such progress would come at a price; that Juninho-inspired week of wins later on in March would give Martin O'Neill something to think about before Wembley. But we were back on track - even if it did all end in tears. Read more...

Back In Time: QPR 1, Middlesbrough 5, 2009/10

A game that everyone thought would set Boro back on the road to promotion...

Football is full of flattering displays; individual performances or wins that you think you can build dreams on, but they merely paper over the cracks and lead to nothing in the end. But far worse than flattering displays are compelling, commanding, convincing displays that offer plenty of reasons to dream, only for the fans to learn, sooner rather than later, that the great performance was a false dawn. An inexplicable fluke. Afonso Alves' beautifully taken double strike against Manchester United was one of these false dawns, and so was Boro's first win under Gordon Strachan, the 5-1 triumph over QPR.

To say it was unanticipated would be a massive understatement. QPR were on a bad run, but had lost just once at home all season, and Boro were already showing signs of becoming Bore-o. Yet the most unpopular manager of the Riverside era (even the insufferable Steve McClaren had some indelible achievements to fall back on) had the nerve to proclaim, after this match had finished, that he "saw it coming". I'm sorry, Gordon, but from where did you draw that conclusion? A reasonable performance against struggling Peterborough and two points from twelve does not a great result preclude.

With that in mind, I wrote Boro off and found myself working during the match instead. To me, the result, like most results under Strachan, didn't matter. Imagine my surprise when I flicked on Final Score and saw the 5-1 scoreline. If there has ever been a more ecstatic reaction from me to a Boro victory, I can't remember it.

More than that, it was fully deserved. It was an open game in which you sensed, although we shaded it early on, that whoever got the first goal would gain the momentum required to claim victory on the day. And it was on-loan Dave Kitson, fresh from scoring a double strike at London Road, who set the ball rolling, volleying home a Gary O'Neil free kick with confidence and aplomb. (Too bad it all went sour for him at Boro after this.) The unpredictable Leroy Lita had probably his best game in a Boro shirt, burying both a penalty and a narrow angled finish with emphatic conviction. (Perhaps too much conviction, actually, judging by his antics on the day - but on days like these, you could really let it pass.) And Mark Yeates, who was to be unfairly sent packing to Sheffield United in the very next transfer window, made us briefly forget Adam Johnson with a sharp, alert performance, culminating in a beaut of a fifth goal. (Even if it could really only be scored by a team with a comfortable lead - watch the goal again and you'll see what I mean.)

It was the sort of match where just about everyone in this rather mixed-up Boro team - it seemed at the time that no one, especially Strachan, knew what the best Boro XI would be! - played magnificently. Yes, even the maligned Sean St. Ledger and the forgotten Isaiah Osbourne. I should have known it was too good to be true...

...and sure enough, Boro got a Blackpool Battering at home three days later. Typical. Read more...

Back In Time: Everton 4, Middlesbrough 0, 1995/96

My first Boxing Day as a Boro fan... How do I loathe thee? Let me count the ways.

When you think of Boro's infamous trouncing by Everton near the end of 1995, the best way to start is by looking at the build-up. Before Juninho made his debut (and snags with work permits had delayed it for a month,too), newly-promoted Boro, inspired by a packed Riverside, a solid defence marshalled by Nigel Pearson and the "midget gems" of Craig Hignett, Nick Barmby and Jan Aage Fjortoft, had risen to fourth in the Premiership table. It was enough to win any "neutral" football fan over - especially me. And the signing of Juninho seemed the icing on the cake.

Unfortunately the arrival of Boro's much loved "Little Fella" coincided with a run of form that, as Four Four Two put it in 1996, made "previously high flying Middlesbrough look more like Middle Yallop reserves." The signing of Juninho was the epitome of the best and worst of Boro in a nutshell - for all the joy, excitement and attention that signings like him offered, they also disrupted team spirit and organisation. His entrance into the 1995 vintage disrupted the attacking flow of the team; the "midget gems" were no more, as Bryan Robson struggled to figure out how to fit both Barmby and Juninho into the same team. In reality, both appeared to play better with Hignett - and he'd had to sacrifice his first team place to accommodate the little Brazilian.

Of course, that didn't matter while Boro prospered. Although Juninho arrived in the midst of a four game winless run (and the loss of Boro's unbeaten record at the Riverside), Boro still managed to turn on the style to beat title challengers Liverpool 2-1 and end the month in sixth place. This, in turn, sparked a revival in our fortunes, with four-goal home wins either side of a narrow loss to then champions Blackburn. It was enough to leave us in fifth place by Christmas, and had we beaten Everton on Boxing Day, we would have gone second.

But Boro, especially under Bryan Robson, tend to be built on rather shaky foundations, as if they are a time bomb ready to go off the moment something goes wrong. That "something" was a series of injuries - according to then physio Bob Ward, Boro had reached the dizzy heights of fourth by using just twelve players in the first eleven games, then had somehow stumbled through those injuries to remain at the heels of the title challengers by Christmas. The real breaking point, however, came when, according to Ward, there was a mix up over the travel arrangements and the kit didn't arrive until a matter of minutes before kick-off.

Everton then proceeded to condemn us to our heaviest defeat of the season. Craig Short, Graham Stuart (2) and a revitalised Andrei Kanchelskis got the goals in what was an embarrassingly one-sided encounter, featuring what was then uncharacteristically sloppy defending from the Boro. The concerns about what would happen if our defence had an off-day on the road were heightened here; we had scored only one goal in four away league matches prior to this one, and had carved out just one real chance in the entire match. And just when we thought it couldn't get any worse, it did - Juninho and Derek Whyte joined a growing treatment table that already featured Barmby and Hignett.

Robson wrote the game off as a "one-off" at the time, but it was anything but. We proceeded to win just seven of our next forty-four Premiership matches, a run that continued until a 6-1 win over Derby in March 1997. More importantly, the Everton thrashing was the clearest indication yet of Boro's vulnerability under pressure, a match that we could have and should have learnt our ultimate lesson from; yet today, as we continue to endure nervy match after nervy match (be honest: how often have you truly felt confident of a Boro victory?), we still seem to have not learnt a thing. Or maybe we're just not capable of what our results sometimes lead us to believe in...

Read more...

Back In Time: Middlesbrough 4, Oxford United 1, 1997/98

Following Manchester City's last ditch title triumph, Si's Insights reminisces about a final day of the season where Boro actually got it right... 

 

“Very often in competitions it goes to the last game. And at one point, it looked as if you were going to qualify with a little ease, not easily, but with one or two points to spare, and now here you are, in a battle. In a war.”

- The late Sir Bobby Robson

Seven years ago today, we denied Manchester City the opportunity to pip us in the race for a European place. As you all remember, Schwarzer's injury-time penalty save broke their hearts and paved the way for The Road To Eindhoven the following year.

It was notable for being one of the few "dramatic final days" where Boro actually got it right - and City would "get it right" themselves seven years later, in the most remarkable fashion. Where there were what if's, if only's and tears of sadness in 2005, there were tears of joy in 2012.

Likewise, the despondency in Middlesbrough in 1997 was replaced by delight in 1998.

But, like City fans, we must have been wondering why we could never do things the easy way.

Lest we forget that we were in the hunt for a Champions League place during 2004/05, until injuries to key players kicked in... and that we were three points clear at the top of the then Nationwide Division One at the end of February 1998, with a League Cup Final to look forward to.

Then, disaster struck.

The cup final was lost and we picked up just one point from our next five away games. When we lost 1-0 at Sheffield United, we were four points adrift of the automatic promotion places, and I was personally ready to concede that we had lost second spot to in-form Sunderland.

However, the pendulum slowly swung, and when the Black Cats unexpectedly crashed to a 2-0 defeat at Ipswich, automatic promotion was in our hands again. A point at home to Wolves meant that a win on the last day of the season against Oxford United would take us up, no matter how our rivals performed.

Trust Boro not to make things easy though. We were both laboured and nervy against a well-organised Oxford defence in the first half, and the half-time whistle couldn't have been more welcome. Things got worse when we heard that Sunderland had raced into a 2-0 lead at Swindon, in their last ditch bid to usurp us. But our luck held.

Two pieces of Paul Merson magic unlocked the Oxford backline for the Newcastle-born - ah, the glorious irony! - Alun Armstrong to take us from a shaky position to a relatively comfortable one right at the start of the second half.  Armstrong's sixth and seventh Boro goals were made even more remarkable by the fact that he'd delayed a back operation to play, needing an injection prior to the match!

Once the pressure was off, we really began to play, and it was left for Craig Hignett to gild the lily with two excellent strikes to seal our promotion to the Premier League at last. A Nicky Banger consolation (that Mark Schwarzer really should have saved) failed to dampen the spirit of the then capacity Riverside crowd. By this point, I was already enjoying a drink and singing Chumbawamba's Tubthumping at full volume.

“We got knocked down, but we got up again, you’re never gonna keep us down...”

In retrospect, Boro's promotion success had its casualties, both short-term and long term. Club captain and inspiration Nigel Pearson called an end to his playing career due to a troublesome knee. We inexplicably decided not to offer Hignett a new deal. But at least they had gone out on a high. The same could not be said for the likes of Merson, Armstrong, Mikkel Beck and Marco Branca. In 1998/99, we saw injuries end the possibility of a very profitable striking partnership at the top level, Beck dropping out of the first team picture to make way for Brian Deane (yes), and Merson flip-flopping from praising Boro to the skies to condemning their lack of ambition and drinking culture.

Ah well. At least Hamilton Ricard proved the doubters wrong, and at least Bryan Robson established us as a Premiership club, right? At least until his mismanagement of the Okon-Karembeu-Boksic brigade led to the call for Terry Venables... Read more...

Back In Time: Middlesbrough 8, Manchester City 1, 2007/08

In a week of nostalgia, Si's Insights looks back at a game that pulled the wool over everyone's eyes...

With our season over, the last week or so has been one of "looking back" on Planet Boro. We've already reminisced about our promotion-clinching 4-1 win over Oxford United on May 3, 1998 (which will feature in next week's "Back In Time" column) and, of course, Eindhoven, which had a build up to remember but an aftermath to forget. Instead of being the new beginning we hoped it would be, it was the beginning of the end, with a crippling debt and gradual mismanagement of a solid spine eventually leading to a relegation we've still to recover from.

Today (May 11) sees the anniversary of both the worst and best of Boro - Juninho's tears at Elland Road (1997) and one of the most incredible but ultimately irrelevant results in the history of the club (2008). Yes, it's four years to the day since we battered Sven's men.

What a day it was. Regardless of how divided Manchester City were, how little both sides had to play for, and how different the scoreline might have been had Richard Dunne stayed on the pitch, you couldn't help but react to the scoreline with amazement. Boro hadn't scored more than two goals in a match all season prior to this game. They'd won just twice in thirteen league and cup games prior to the previous match, a 2-0 home win against a Portsmouth team who had one eye on the FA Cup final. And no Boro player had scored more than once in a game until Afonso Alves suddenly and inexplicably netted a double in April... against the future double winners.

On the surface, this really was perversity of the highest order. Stewart Downing netted twice in a match for the only time in a Boro shirt (and his second was a beaut). Fabio Rochemback literally saved the best for last with a hard working, clever performance featuring a free kick that still has to be seen to be believed. Afonso Alves scored his one and only Boro hat-trick.

And, even more importantly...

Our biggest Premier League win, the then biggest win for anyone in the Premier League this century (until Spurs bettered it with a 9-1 trouncing of Wigan), and the first Boro player to score a hat-trick in four years.

How could any self-respecting Boro fan not be filled with self-belief after a game like that?

Alas, the trouncing of Manchester City was a mirage, not an oasis.

The summer of 2008 saw Rochemback, George Boateng, Lee Cattermole, Mark Schwarzer and Luke Young all depart, without really being replaced. New signings Justin Hoyte and Didier Digard were exposed as lightweight the following season, as was Alves, despite free kicks like this one. Tuncay picked and chose his games, Downing had an off season. Just about everything that could go wrong for us in 2008/09 did.

And you may not have seen it at the time, but the 8-1 win over City and its aftermath actually foreshadowed 2008/09 pretty well. Just how well would Boro have coped that day against eleven well-organised men who actually had something to play for? If you look at the goals again, you'll notice that Alves had a ridiculous amount of space for all three of his goals. The same is true for Downing's second goal, well executed though it was, and Aliadiere's goal. And, lest we forget, Adam Johnson's goal needed a deflection to find its way into the net.

The truth is, despite the sporadic promise we had shown in Southgate's first two seasons, we had really only just escaped the dreaded drop... on both occasions.

Should we really have been that surprised that trying to enforce Southgate's Arsenal-lite style of play with an even weaker squad would lead to relegation?

And, while both Manchester City and Boro have faced their fair share of trials and tribulations since that day,  nowadays, we're really little more than an average Championship side, while City are set to be crowned champions of England.

Afonso Alves, who we thought was the answer to our goalscoring problems, eventually left for Qatar, while Adam Johnson, who at one point couldn't even get into our first team, is on the verge of picking up a Premier League winners' medal.

Who would have seen that happening four years ago? Read more...

Back In Time: Middlesbrough 4, Steaua Bucharest 2, 2005/06

As the exciting conclusion to our season approaches, Si's Insights looks back at the last time we gave ourselves hope of a great end to the season - on the anniversary of the occasion too...

Happy Anniversary, Everyone!

Has it really been exactly six years since we defied the odds for the second consecutive European home game, and gave our little town its most exciting European football night ever?

The win over Banik Ostrava was a delight, a convincing victory in our first ever match in Europe. The Lazio triumph was a truly exemplary performance, featuring a full house and Bolo Zenden's only Boro brace. But as far as drama and value for money goes, neither could match the Great Comebacks of our second European campaign - and for good reason.

I certainly didn't see the Basle (or is it Basel?) performance coming. Our league form that season was what you'd call schizophrenic - for every home hammering by Villa and Charlton, there was a home hammering of Manchester United and Chelsea - and we'd already lost 2-0 in the away leg. With that in mind, it seemed to matter little that I had chosen to support my local musical society's production of "Guys And Dolls" on the same night our second leg was due to be played.

I more than expected to be disappointed when I returned home and keyed in page 302 on the soon to be defunct Ceefax (the times are changing, and fast), instead, I was greeted by the headline:

BORO STORM PAST BASLE INTO SEMIS

I was both elated and annoyed at the same time. Elated in that we'd defied the odds in such an unexpected manner. Annoyed in that (a) I'd missed such a dramatic comeback, (b) once again, we'd shown our inconsistency. Even more annoyingly, I later found that only (well, that's how we saw it back then) 24,521 turned up to see it!

But suddenly, being seemingly the only Middlesbrough fan in the North West of Ireland didn't seem so bad after all. Words like “Unbelievable” and “It’s amazing what wee Middlesbrough can do what they want” were heard from my colleagues within the coming days. 

Why did I have to miss it? Luckily, I'd get another chance...

Three weeks later, and Boro’s topsy-turvy season had gone from good to bad to possibly worse. We had swarmed over West Ham United in the first half of the FA Cup semi-final at Villa Park. Then Dean Ashton intervened and ruined everything, his aerial challenge putting Mark Schwarzer out of action for almost the rest of the season. Brad Jones stepped into goal, Boro hearts sank, and before you knew it, West Ham were in the ascendancy. Slightly unfair though it seemed, Marlon Harewood’s winner (set up by, you guessed it, Ashton) had a tinge of inevitability about it.

Our season looked over. We would now have to win the UEFA Cup to guarantee European football for 2006/07. And how likely was it that we’d recover from such a deflation, even though 1-0 seemed an undoubtedly easier deficit to turn over in the semi-final second leg, against Steaua Bucharest?

The fans certainly believed it was possible, though, as evidenced by the capacity Riverside crowd that night. This time, I was at home, and switched on the computer to listen to Century Radio, eagerly anticipating another comeback. One that I hoped would be less nail-biting.

Twenty-six minutes in, and I had switched my computer off. Two almost typical Brad Jones fumbles had resulted in two Steaua goals, and our Captain (but not Manager) Fantastic Southgate had limped off. Jon Champion, commentating for ITV that night, was to say: “Comebacks like Basle only happen once in a lifetime”. And I definitely agreed with him, for a few minutes anyway.

At this moment, a realisation hit me. If this really was to be our last UEFA Cup match for the indefinite future, why not enjoy listening to what's left of it? So I lay down and switched on BBC Radio Five Live, listening calmly to what Boro would do for the remainder of the match.

Things had actually improved before the half-time break. Massimo Maccarone, on for Southgate, had pulled one back, and we had continued to pour forward before the players had to go in at the interval.

I didn't know this at the time, but the continuous mounting Boro pressure had forced Jon Champion to tempt fate: "It couldn't happen again, could it?"

Or could it? When Viduka met Downing's cross, I allowed myself to punch the air, but remained pretty relaxed. We still needed two more, and, unlike Basle, Steaua wouldn't be playing the last twenty minutes with ten men.

Then, it happened. Stewie's cross caused pandemonium in the Steaua box... and Chris Riggott atoned handsomely for his awful miss in the FA Cup semi. Suddenly, I was up on my feet. Yes, it was possible.

It’s incredible, really, how clearly I can remember my reactions during the final moments of this game. With a few minutes left, Chris Waddle had declared how "tired" the Boro lads looked, and at that stage I really was tempted to think that our chance had gone. But Steaua were tired too, not to mention nervous, and when Stewie capitalised on very uncertain defending to fire in that cross for Maccarone...

I must have jumped around constantly for... I don't know, more than a minute! And there was still the agony of Ugo Ehiogu's handball to listen through.

I had just four words for a workmate the following day: “Well… we did it.”

In the end, as you know, we didn’t do it. We got hammered in Eindhoven, and later it was revealed we made a massive loss on our UEFA Cup campaign. It was yet another lesson in what living The Dream can do to you. Sometimes I think it was as if Steve McClaren knew about this loss and, like Harry Redknapp at Pompey, decided to abandon a sinking ship the moment he was presented with the chance.

And today, even after Mogga's management and the club's more sensible economic measures have helped to steady the ship, one must wonder:

Will we ever get that kind of European adventure again?

Still, what a ride…

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Back In Time: Manchester United 3, Middlesbrough 3, 1996/97

Si's Insights looks back at a classic game which, unfortunately, had consequences...

Even before this season began, the pluses and minuses of Tony Mowbray's Boro were all too clear to see. Our current squad has some really good individual players, and is capable of playing some sparkling football, but can also let their heads go down too often when the going gets tough.

Lest we forget that in 2010/11, we let a commanding 3-1 lead at home to Swansea turn into a 4-3 defeat, and got hammered home and away by then future champions QPR.

So are you surprised about the way the current season's going? Really?

In truth, this is nothing new with Boro, as my "classic game" of the week illustrated almost fifteen years ago.

Forget the 1-0 win over Chelsea in March 1997, magnificent though it was - this was the game that epitomized 1996/97 in a nutshell. It had it all - goals, attacking wizardry, spirit, good defending, bad defending, crazy weather... and even a little bit of controversy.

One thing about "big" teams, and Manchester United are no different, of course, is that they often want to referee games themselves as well as play. But a lack of fussiness from the officials, coupled with a distinct lack of pressure and that little bit extra emotional investment on the day, saw us play above ourselves in a manner no sane Boro fan would have dreamed of.

This was one of the rare occasions where the Foreign Legion played like a team and inspired those around them. Emerson's strike, the last decent thing he did that season, was very well taken, but it's the first and third Boro goals that leave the longest lasting impression. Look again at how Ravanelli (typical of our luck for most of that season, we lost him to a season-ending injury in this game) and Juninho link effortlessly with the rest of the team before Juni scores what would be one of the Goals Of The Season. And look at the way the third goal is created and scored - Stamp, Freestone and Mustoe combining brilliantly before Craig Hignett scores one of his most memorable goals in a Boro shirt. Not a foreigner in sight!

Yet our Foreign Legion's influence on the game was undeniable that day. Even if they were aided by what the not-yet-Sir Alex Ferguson said was the worst defensive display he'd seen from his team in years, it was their goals, and their movement - especially Juninho's - that inspired the rest of the team beyond belief. Our defence, too, with Big Nige at his most determined, was excellent - but sadly not quite capable of holding out for the win that would have ensured our survival, three points or no three points. To this day, I can't help wondering... what if we hadn't allowed Gary Neville to fire United back into it before the break? We would have then been spared the agony of having the game rest on the admittedly contentious decision not to allow a penalty after a "foul" by Phil Stamp.

Ultimately, though, the game illustrated what we had missed throughout the month of April 1997 - Juninho doing what he does best. Helping us to win. It was clear that repeated, unwelcome attention from man-marking, coupled with fatigue, had drained both him and us of confidence that month. By May, he was back at his best and terrorizing defences, albeit too late for us.

Luckily for him - and us - his real reward in a Boro shirt was to come, seven years later.

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Back In Time: Middlesbrough 4, Coventry 0, 1996/97

September sunshine. A packed Riverside stadium. Attacking wizardry on the pitch. Surely it seemed too good to believe? It was...

 

Ah, 1996. It's funny how we can be so selective with the benefit of hindsight. The way Boro fans look back on that year, you'd think it was a year to treasure, one that we would never see again. And in a way, they're right.

The then state-of-the-art Riverside Stadium was full every week, we were playing football we'd never dreamed we'd play, we were signing players that we thought would never come anywhere near Middlesbrough, the club was churning out quality publications like Riverside Red and Riverside Roar, and timeless music - that is to say, the best of Britpop, be it Oasis, Blur or Ocean Colour Scene - was blazing in our headphones and speakers.

Yet the fact is, we only won six league games that year. Was the division between our star players and more workmanlike pros too great to bridge? Were we too reliant on Nigel Pearson at the back? Was it Bryan Robson's largely wrong-headed tactics? Or was there something in the club's Christmas dinner of 1995? Take your pick.

Still, it's undeniable how memorable most of those wins were. And I'll start the "Back In Time" series by taking you back to one of those rare occasions where we lived up to expectations...

Coming off a 4-1 trouncing of West Ham in midweek, we were favourites to turn over Coventry, who had begun the season with just one point in four games. And turn them over we did, in a 4-0 victory that saw all three of our "foreign legion" excel. With no hint of the settling in problems that were to come, Emerson, described back then by The Independent's Scott Barnes as "arguably the most complete player in his position in the country", bossed midfield, while Juninho and Ravanelli got the goals. Of special note are the second and third goals - the kind that we probably took for granted in those days.

When I watch the game today, I notice how the foreign stars inspired our so called "ordinary" players to play above themselves. Watch again how perennial unsung hero Robbie Mustoe links up with Juninho for the second goal, and sets up Ravanelli for the third with a deceptively simple pass. And it does look like his long diagonal pass sets the ball rolling for the fourth goal too. This game was really as much about the unsung heroes as it was the Brazilian - and Italian - magic. On the surface, this was Boro at their best.

What the highlights aren't entirely telling you is that this game was also indicative of Boro at their worst. Remember the awful Phil Whelan (part of our defence that day)? No? Well, I'm not surprised... he was more than an inadequate replacement for "Big Nige", he just wasn't up to the demands of Premiership football, full stop. And he was part of a three man defence that three times let Coventry in for clear headers. Better finishers would have punished us.

Sure enough, there were other times during the match when we were almost punished - it took an excellent save from the much-maligned Allan Miller to deny John Salako at 2-0 up. Miller also turned a shot onto the post. And what if - what if - at 1-0 up, future Boro man Noel Whelan's "equaliser" had stood? Ravanelli might have been looked even more miserable than he did after his second goal.

Yes, I said it - miserable. Watch Ravanelli celebrate the second goal again, and you'll see he looks almost apathetic. He's just scored his sixth goal of the season, we're 3-0 up, and... this? It's as if he already senses things aren't well and is now playing the "I'm Now A Celebrity, Get Me Out Of Here" card that so many of our players have played over the years (see: Mark Viduka, Robert Huth). It's enough to vindicate The Sunday Times' David Walsh's point that these foreign stars really only came to Boro to make a buck. Is it any wonder Juninho was believed when he said he wanted to stay, while Ravanelli wasn't?

I don't mean to demean what was undoubtedly a memorable performance, one of breathtaking quality for the most part (at least up front). And it did put us joint top of the Premiership goalscorers chart for a week.

But we made a mistake on building dreams on a display like this, hoping that the virtuosity of our attack would be enough to compensate for a second-tier defence and wrong-headed tactics. Arsenal and Southampton would soon expose our central flaws... as would a relegation at the end of the season. Read more...

Something Happened On The Way To Heaven...

It was a very Untypical Boro day, in what was a very good year to be a Boro fan.

When it comes to my own memories of exactly eight years ago, I guess they begin with the final line of Peter Schmeichel’s Carling Cup Final preview in The Sunday Times on February 29, 2004. I still remember it quite vividly, not to mention the resentment I felt when reading it:

“By a height shorter than Juninho, I think the advantage lies with Bolton.”

There you have it - the press writing us off, yet again. Although at the same time, I suppose he had a good point. On our way to the Carling Cup Final, we’d twice needed penalties, once needed extra time – at home to Brighton! – and were fortunate to edge out a deliberately under strength Arsenal side. Would we have beaten them at all had Henry and Pires been playing? That, and before the semi-final we’d only scored three goals in normal time throughout the entire competition. Bolton had netted five in the second leg of their semi final alone.

But I think Schmeichel’s reasoning went beyond that – he knew as well as we did how consistently Boro had flattered to deceive over the years, always pretending to be the next big thing while never being the actual big thing. He must’ve been thinking what we were also thinking – that Boro would repeatedly tantalise their fans with the promise of success, but ultimately, they were doomed to fail.

Until 29/02/04, that is.

In fairness, you really couldn’t bank on Boro, especially not in 2003/04. The team we had back then could battle their way to an impressive victory at Old Trafford, but could also fold limply at home to Blackburn. One was almost as likely as the other, and sure enough, both happened that season.

What people tend to forget is that we had a very good team that year too – in fact, I’m happy to go out on a limb and say that, at full strength, it was the best team that Steve McClaren assembled. Yes, I can still remember my fellow countryman Alan Green laughing at the quality of our team very early on in the season, but he conveniently failed to mention that injuries, suspensions and problems with international clearances had robbed us of numerous key men.

Juninho, everyone’s favourite player (well, almost everyone’s), was playing in front of a midfield he could only have dreamed of playing in during those “halcyon days” of 1997. Gaizka Mendieta was playing his best football for us on the right of midfield, something that he would never quite replicate again following an unfortunate injury later that year. On the left you had Bolo Zenden, the finest attacking midfielder to grace the Riverside Stadium. Joining him was the best defensive midfielder of the Riverside years – all round good guy and fulcrum of the team, George Boateng. Behind him, our Captain Fantastic Gareth Southgate played alongside his favourite defensive partner, Ugo Ehiogu, while either side of them you had the eccentric but excellent Franck Queudrue and the erratic but occasionally brilliant Danny Mills. Luckily for him, this was one of his better days. Add the imposing frame of Mark Schwarzer behind them, prone to dropping the odd clanger but equally capable of redeeming himself with spectacular saves and a strong presence, and you really had a Riverside Dream Team.

Even dependable Doriva, and Joseph Job, who could be magical went he wanted to, were considerable performers. On the bench we had Massimo Maccarone, Michael Ricketts (don’t laugh – he was genuinely good in this game) and this young winger named Stewart Downing. What happened to him? And then there was Matthew Bates and James Morrison, on the fringes of becoming first teamers, while Szilard Nemeth and Jonathan Greening didn’t even make the final sixteen. These were exciting times to be a Boro fan – especially if we could get it right that day.

Reluctant though I am to admit it, kudos is due to Steve McClaren for putting such an impressive side together, though I still look back on that year, and the two years that followed it, with regret. I believe that McClaren could and should have gotten more out of that team. Our victory that day should have been the time for the media to admit that we had proved them wrong as a club. But they wouldn’t admit it. Instead, Boro’s triumph, our moment – became McClaren’s. The media published pictures of him bringing the Carling Cup home and commented on his remarkable triumph in securing our first ever trophy. And he lapped up every second, all while edging a step closer to clinching his beloved England job. Knowing the right people may have allowed him to put good squads together, but it also allowed him to gain more credit than he actually deserved, which, naturally, suited him down to the ground. What if we’d had a manager who not only knew the right people, but was also a better motivator with his heart in the club? (Ah well, one out of three ain’t bad. Just ask Gareth Southgate.)

But anyway, back to my experience of the final itself...

Would you believe, I missed the first ten minutes! Back then, I didn't have Sky where I lived, so I had to head down the road to the nearest recreation club. Hence, I heard Job's goal on the radio (I guess I didn’t expect it to arrive so soon), and arrived at the club just in time to see Zenden take his penalty. When he converted it, albeit fortuitously (yes, I know it shouldn't have stood), I celebrated calmly. There were no Boro fans in the bar, so I had to enjoy what could be my greatest moment as a Boro fan without the necessary atmosphere. It wasn't easy.

But, as we were 2-0 up, I didn't care. Then Schwarzer made his mistake, Bolton were back in the match, and suddenly I was on edge. At least Skippy wasted no time in atoning for that mistake, although I still experienced a genuine heart-in-mouth moment when Per Frandsen’s shot was tipped on to the post!

I have to admit, until the final minute – and Mike Riley’s failure to spot Ugo’s handball – there were no more notable heart-in-mouth moments, even though I couldn’t take my eyes off the match for one second. The reason for that is, for the most part, we really did do our job to perfection in a wonderful, fast-paced final. It was nice to score the fastest goal in a domestic cup final for a change, too (although sadly, John Arne Riise would smash Job’s record a year later).

Boro being Boro, however, didn’t make it easy for themselves, with Mendieta, Juninho and Ricketts all blowing chances to seal it. I still remember holding my head in my hands after watching what should have been the icing on the cake for us. Instead, I was left to count down the final ten seconds of injury time until Mike Riley blew the whistle, Juninho collapsed on the turf in joy, and I nearly collapsed myself… on to the floor of the recreation club in utter disbelief. All eight years of supporting Boro had paid off, and I couldn’t believe what had actually happened. We’d done it.

It had taken 128 years, but at long last, we were going to lift a major trophy – and we had European football to look forward to later that year. The new Boro dream was only just beginning.

February 29, 2004 was memorable not just for the trophy itself, and what it meant to the club, fans and Steve Gibson, but also for being the day we were able to finally shake the “Typical Boro” tag and forget everything that had threatened to derail our dreams over the years. At long last, we could put the “three points” fiasco and everything the likes of Emile Heskey, Steve Claridge, Pontus Kamark, Roberto Di Matteo and Pierre Van Hooijdonk had done to bed. 

And how good did it feel?

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