King boasts an impressive goal scoring record. He began his career at Barnet scoring 14 in 53 appearances. He then signed for Gillingham in 2000 where he stayed for 3 years scoring 40 goals in 101 games. King signed for Nottingham Forest scoring another 10 in 50 games but the fans never took to him at Forest and he was loaned out twice, first to Leeds where he failed to score in 9 appearances and then to Watford where he scored an impressive 12 in 21 games. King’s successful loan spell at Watford prompted Aidy Boothroyd to make his move permanent with a fee of £500,000 being agreed in the January of 2006. He followed his 12 goals in the first half of the season with another 9 in the second half to finish top scorer in the Championship and was awarded Watford’s Player of the Season award on their way to promotion to the Premiership. He however missed most of Watford’s season in the Premiership through injury which many believe was the main cause behind Watford’s poor showing. He did however notch 4 goals that season. King returned to full fitness and scored 10 goals in the first half of the following season, alongside Boro’s Adam Johnson, before Wigan paid approximately £5 million for him in January. King has since struggled at Wigan, scoring only once in 15 appearances and was loaned out to Hull for the first half of this season. King has also bagged 10 goals in 18 matches for Jamaica. His career record is 116 goals in 341 matches at all levels which averages out to be about a goal every third game.

For all King’s scoring exploits he has also had his fair share of controversy. His falling out with Phil Brown is just another in the long list of incidents that have thrown question marks over King’s personality. Back when he was at Gillingham he served a 5 month jail sentence for handling a stolen car. And since he has joined Hull he apparently head butted Dean Windass in a casino after an argument between the pair, and in the last month he has been banned from driving for being caught driving 106 miles per hour on a 60 miles per hour road and has also been arrested on suspicion of punching a 20 year old woman in a bar.

There is no doubt about King’s goal scoring record but there are some serious question marks over his personality and you have to question whether he is as good as Mido. However, if he has been signed as an addition to Mido rather than a replacement for him then he may be a good option that we can turn to when Alves and Mido are firing blanks.

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Boro sign Marlon King

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O’Neil out, Watson and Eagles in?

Mido has scored 4 goals (all of which were from open play) in only 5 Premier League starts, admittedly he has also had 8 substitute appearances! But compare this to Alves’ 4 goals (only 2 from open play) in 18 starts and 2 substitute appearances and you begin to question how Alves commands a starting place week in week out whilst, at best, Mido sits on the bench. Not only do the statistics favour Mido, but when you consider what each player brings to the team, then surely, if Southgate sticks to his claims that he plays players on form and not reputation, Mido starts ahead of Alves every time. Mido, unlike Alves, poses a serious aerial threat, is strong, hustles defenders and has the ability to hold the ball up and bring our most influential players (namely Tuncay, Downing and to some extent Adam Johnson) into the game in areas of the field that they can really hurt teams. The only reason Alves is there is because he is a “potent goal scorer” but the statistics suggest that Mido is also better at that.

Ok Mido may be a loose cannon, a bit erratic at times, but he has got that bit of flair and passion in him which we are severely lacking at the moment. Some might say we are becoming a team that symbolizes our current manager. By this I mean that we are becoming a team of nice players, players that take the sensible options. That’s fine, great in fact, in certain areas of the field but up front we need someone who is going to do that something out of the blue that turns the game on its head. Mido is the only player we have that has that ability.

We all know that a lack of goals has been a major problem, yet again this season. But we have also had major problems with keeping possession and conceding goals. All this adds up to a very worrying predicament. But could it be possible that one player could help, in small doses, to fix all these problems?

The first problem is probably the most obvious problem that Mido could help solve. But I’m not just talking about Mido scoring himself; I’m relating more to the fact that he could help others around him get goals. Mido is big, strong and powerful and therefore he can not only win a lot of balls in the air, which would be useful at gaining possession in more advanced areas, but he is also in the Viduka-mould of being able to hold the ball up. This means that the likes of Tuncay, Downing and even Alves (if he is played on the same team as Mido) are able to get up and receive the ball in goal scoring areas. But not only would Mido’s ability of holding up the ball and winning the ball in the air help our goal scoring problems but it would also help our other two problems. Obviously the more balls he wins in the air, the more possession we have but also the longer he holds the ball up for and the more possession he can win in the opposition’s half of the field, the less constant pressure our defence would have to face and it would also give our defence time to regroup instead of continuously being on the back foot.

The only way out of the mess we are in is to play to our strengths and clearly passing through the midfield isn’t one of them. Therefore it would be of more use to stick Mido up front, and start trying to pick him out from full back areas and then get the likes of Downing, Alves and Tuncay to get as close as they can to him and pick up the pieces in and around the box. It might not be pretty but it can’t be any less effective than what we are doing at the moment.

How we are trying to flog him off in exchange for players like Marlon King, Marlon Harewood and Alan Smith, who have average ability at best, is beyond me. He could well be our life line this season in the same way as Viduka was 2 seasons ago.

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Ahmed Hossam Hussein Abdelhamid