By Tim Sigsworth
Four games in: one draw, three losses. It hasn’t exactly been the start Jonathan Woodgate would have been hoping for.
Arguably, Boro should have at least six points on the board, however. Had Britt Assombalonga not blazed his penalty over the bar at 3-2 up against Luton and had Ashley Fletcher’s brace against Brentford not been wrongly ruled out, there would be little to none of the hyperbole that has swirled on social media in recent days.
Write-offs of Woodgate as a manager and ridiculous assertions that a relegation scrap is unavoidable are far wide of the mark. But what else should really be expected from portions of the fanbase which have grown bloated in their peculiar sense of entitlement to success in recent years.
As equally ridiculous as the above is that it is necessary to write a piece in response to such doom-saying pessimism.
First of all, Woodgate is a long-term appointment for a club which is aspiring to become long-term thinkers. Over the last thirty years, long-termism has been pivotal whenever Boro have achieved success - only when the club, its fans and the wider area have become fixated on the short-term, whether that be as a result of unrealistic expectations or (as we have seen in recent seasons) potential financial windfalls, has desire for success proven detrimental.
Similar trends can be plotted in recent Football League and Premier League seasons, too. The most successful teams haven’t been the ones who, like Huddersfield Town, Fulham, Sunderland, Stoke City and ourselves, have spent the most money in an attempt to spend their way to promotion or safety from relegation with a non-existent or wavering regard for a sustainable and enduring philosophy, but those who, like AFC Bournemouth, Brighton, Burnley, Sheffield United and Watford, have stuck by a long-term club-wide or managerial philosophy.
Woody and his coaching team, which comprises a group of individuals who have never previously worked together for an extended period, are attempting to implement a style of play which is radically different to Pulisball and demands constant physical and mental commitment onto a thin squad whose only additions have come via a reconfigured recruitment model of similar immaturity to the management team and from the academy.
It will take time for the new signings, all of which apart from Tomas Mejias spent pre-season away from the club and are native to or were recruited from London, and the youngsters to gel with the squad and to get up to speed with what Woodgate’s smoggenpress demands of them.
Hayden Coulson has done well playing as a full-back with the attacking responsibilities, due to Ashley Fletcher’s role as a false left-winger who vacates the space a traditional winger would operate in when Boro are in attack, of a wing-back whilst Marc Bola has shown promise in the same role and Marcus Browne has displayed glimpses of the tricky, technically-gifted attacking midfielder Boro have been crying out for since Gaston Ramirez. Nathan Wood and Aynsley Pears also deserve mentions.
Additionally, Dael Fry, Boro’s best ball-playing centre-half, is yet to play this season following a deliberately slow rehabilitation period. His and George Friend’s comfort on the ball and their ability to carry the ball out from the back will aid Boro’s build-up play and help minimise the shakiness that has been emblematic of Boro’s backline when pressed this season
Seeing them two feature more often at the back, as well as reducing the gung-ho pressing from the back four that left huge gaps at the back against Brentford and Crewe in particular, would no doubt prove beneficial to overall game management.
In midfield, Woodgate’s 4-3-3 has often seemed unbalanced. With Paddy McNair and Lewis Wing both operating high up the pitch as roaming playmakers, defensive midfielder Adam Clayton has been persistently isolated and bypassed so far this season due to the numerical superiority of opposition attackers in the centre of the pitch when Boro are countered.
Against Blackburn, Boro played a 4-2-3-1 with McNair and Wing as an advanced, box-to-box pivot and Howson almost as an extra man in front of them with the freedom to press and attack right across the final third. Although, as in every game so far this season, Boro set up to boss the game and subsequently enjoyed a lot of the ball in the opposition half, they only created one major chance and struggled to contain Rovers’ rapid attacking play.
To improve play in the centre of the park and minimise the speed and effectiveness of opposition counters, playing Howson as a box-to-box midfielder alongside Wing in his usual role and ahead of Clayton in defensive midfield may well do the trick.
However, despite these negatives, Boro’s pressing game has been good in the final third, with the central midfielders joining the usual front three of Fletcher, Assombalonga and Johnson in closing down opposition defenders and midfielders and forcing errors, whilst our full-backs have been pivotal in bringing the ball out of defence, spreading the play, creating numerical superiorities on the wings.
Although Boro have struggled to break down Brentford, Crewe and Blackburn when they adopted deep blocks and a generally more conservative approach, there are positives about the way we are playing. Weaknesses will be worked out as management makes tweaks here and there and the team gets sharper in terms of match fitness, too.
Boro are a work in progress, but nevertheless a work in progress which has created a significant number of chances, has shown attacking promise and is deserving of more points than we currently have despite an unbalanced, relatively thin squad with players missing and a still-bonding coaching team which is attempting to introduce drastically different style of play.
In terms of implementing a playing style, integrating youth prospects, fine-tuning a more cost-effective recruitment system and establishing a club-wide culture on and off the pitch, this season is all about the next.
Trust the process, it’s early days still.
