Boro Mania

After a difficult trilogy of away games, we finally return to Teesside this weekend in a match that sees the Boro of today against a little bit of Boro from yesterday.

I'm sure most Boro fans who can fathom a rational opinion on football will agree that we have not been a poor side at all this season, but we've still been watching our away form fall below the tide. The Portsmouth and Man Utd games are the only away matches... and only matches really i can honestly say we played utterly poor and deserved to leave without something.

The Sunderland game was painful to watch in that respect. We kind of have a reputation now of being a hard working side and I'm not going to joke around in the fact that we often have to work hard for our goals. We don't score goals as freely as say... Manchester City who lately seem to be bagging them for fun, or Aston Villa who are doing the same. The chances we get come in fewer amounts and we need to be converting them at every available opportunity. The fact is we were handed 3 points on a plate last week and it just speaks volumes... when it gets easy, we just don't seem to cut it... i think we relax too much when we've got the momentum on occasions and we crumble slightly when we go a goal down, especially against what I'd call lesser teams, and definately at the death where we seem a lot more prone to lapses in concentration!

The fact that Michael Chopra scored two goals and made mugs out of two supposed excellent defenders is just embarrassing and I'm utterly ashamed. It's not just down to a team effort though, we appear to be a bit flat in defence... unforced silly errors such as Wheaters ridiculous back-pass on Tuesday are things that need to be clamped down on. Perhaps relegation to the bench will be a good thing. I hope Southgate wasn't just feeding us bull when he said no-one was safe, hm... we'll see.

Looking on the bright side though, we have an un-blemished home record at the moment and we have a very good chance of turning the Riverside into a fortress with a hat-trick of home wins. Both our home games have been good adverts for Premiership football and hopefully that will continue tomorrow. I'm not going to throw in some silly comment that we seem a lot more confident at home because it's just not true at the moment. Its wierd how football works in the sense that you can play well at home and win, but you take that same form away and lose [Sunderland and Pompey not withstanding]. Does the home crowd really make that much of a difference to the game? That's a question unfortunately i have no answer to, but hopefully it's Fortress Riverside here we come!

spot the 'Boo'ro fans...

Unfortunately, the recent results and antics on the pitch, notably Pogatetz' tackle, has seen the return of the "Boro Boo Boys". I don't know what it is with [some] Boro fans really... so fickle! I suppose you can't buy a scapegoat at the butchers, so you might as well just choose one at random. It wasn't long ago we were celebrating our best start to the season in god knows how many years, but a few average performances by a couple of players gets them written off for the rest of the season and labelled "shite".

Boro blogger Anthony Vickers [The Evening Gazette] has captured the mood perfectly.

Vickers today told the Evening Gazette: "Our best and most creative player is starting to get stick after two average games in defiance of his out-standing contributions in recent years [Downing I'm guessing]; Hoyte has been written off after a couple of hours action in exactly the same way Luke Young was last year just before he stepped up a gear to become the most consistent performer of the season!" He wrote.

"Alves is being slated for not being up to it even though he scored six in six at the back end of last term; Jinky - who became an icon and saviour in waiting by not playing - is now being denounced as not up to the job; it is open season on Aliadiere; Digard, prematurely pronounced a proto-Zidane so recently is now a water-carrier; and cult hero and leader by example Pogatetz has been downgraded to a headcase again.... oh no, we're all going to die!"

West Brom

West Brom, now somewhat considered a yo-yo club since the start of the decade, were one of the founding members of The Football League in 1888 and have spent the majority of their existence in the top tier of English football. They have been champions of England only once, in 1920, but have had more success in the FA Cup, with five wins. The first came in 1888, the year the league was founded, and the most recent in 1968, their last major trophy. They also won the Football League Cup [now known as the Carling Cup] at the first attempt in 1966. Since the early 1980s the club has been less successful. From 1986 to 2002 they spent their longest ever period out of the top division, although there has been something of a revival in recent years; when the FA Premier League was founded in 1992 the club found themselves in division two. 08–09 will be the club's fourth season in the Premier League since 2002.

West Brom have a strong Middlesbrough connection at the moment. Manager Tony Mowbray is considered somewhat in high regard here on Teesside. He inherited his current captain Jonathan Greening from Gary Megson and he's considered undroppable at the moment. Chris Brunt, a former Boro trainee has found his feet in football since being recruited by Mowbray also, taking the Championship by storm. The most notable player to mention though is our youth and UEFA cup hero... [rather their] non other than promising central midfielder James Morrison which, undoubtedly, i'd describe as a steal. It was definitely a mistake to sell up, considering his raw talent. I think he'll be a big player for the Baggies and they'll definitely benefit from his talent this season. Currently he has five games under his belt, scoring two premiership goals. Do you think Mowbray was laughing at us, or do you think he took him reluctantly? Nah, didnt think so!

Aswell as the Boro boys, they have a very capable squad although their recent play would seem to suggest otherwise. Mowbray wasted no time this summer, bringing in no less than eleven players into the Hawthorns.

Former Real Madrid and Mallorca ace Borja Valero became their record signing in a £4.7m deal, and with him came other stars such as Scott Carson [£3.25m Liverpool], a bargain in Marek Cech [£1.4m Porto], Dutch promising defender Gianni Zuiverloon... [£2.3m Heerenveen] watch out this guy, hes going to be big! and Ex Villa star Luke Moore [£3m]. Unfortunately, good players also left this summer. Kevin Phillips carries on defying his age, finding goals, including the kitchen sink to throw at opposition teams and long time Boro target Zoltan Gera decided to kill his career by going to Fulham.

Middlesbrough: Possible formation and Team Talk

4-4-2: Turnbull, Hoyte, Wheater, Huth, Taylor, Aliadiere, Digard, O'Neil, Downing, Mido, Alves -

There's still debate on whether Turnbull should be given the nod over Jones after the game in mid week. Jones turned in a tidy performance against the champs, but Turnbull has been impressive in each game so far, being praised by many Boro fans and even earning MOM on two occasions by Boro Mania readers.

Wheater's prescence at right back is due to come to an end after being repeatedly caught lacking against Sunderland, which should see him take place back in the centre... It's a shame he can't be dropped at the moment after his error against Man Utd because Riggott who would naturally take his place is guilty of the same.

Its a toss up between O'Neil and Shawky to partner Digard in the centre. O'Neil has put in some lacklustre performances lately and fans are growing impatient, but i can see Southgate giving him the nod as Shawky returns to full fitness following his injury. Arca will probably replace the said player coming off the bench in his effort to regain his place.

Adam Johnson is another player who may or may not make his second start of the season so far. Downing is considered undroppable by Southgate, no matter what he says so its likely we could see him on the right alternating with Downing... or more likely on the bench.

Mido and Alves will be playing upfront. Mido is fit for this weekends clash with West Brom and Alves will continue to find the net, not having scored since the game against Stoke. Mido and Alves showed promising signs against Pompey, and Alves should have hit the net at least twice against Sunderland so i can see that goal streak isn't too far away.

All in all... if we play the same way we did against Sunderland... remove the lapse in concentration and Downing from the penalty spot, then we should be good for a victory.

West Brom: Possible formation and team talk

4-5-1: Carson, Zuiverloon, Donk, Barnett, Olsson, Robinson, Valero, Morrison, Koren, Greening, Bednar

The Baggies were unlucky to lose against Villa last week. In what would seem a more defensive formation, they actually produced a lot of good chances in-front of goal... the only difference being that Villa have the players to finish the moves. Morrison scored the only goal for West Brom taking advantage of poor keeping from Villa's point of view.

Its for that reason that can surmise that West Brom will try to field the same team that played well against Villa, although due to injuries it will slightly change

Middlesbrough Team News

Boro are currently without Tuncay [Knee Ligaments] and Rhys Williams [Another Ligament injury]

Mido is the only doubt for the game, but should be passed fit to start.

Pogatetz sits out the next three domestic games after his red card midweek, which should see Andrew Taylor returned to left back.

West Brom: Team News

West Brom's treatment tables are flooded so far this season. Meite has been sidelined with a calf strain and Chris brunt is out with a leg injury, which should see Ryan Donk inserted into defense.

Albion favourite Neil Clement is also out with a knee injury.

Team vs Team statistics

Boro and WBA have played a total of 87 matches against each other.

Our home record suggests that we have the better chance of winning with our 27 wins and 11 losses.

At home we've also scored on average of 1.75 goals into their net... only conceding an average of 0.75... That's 76 goals vs their 33.

The records aren't as even as you'd like to believe though... West Brom prefer their own ground, where they've won 23 and only lost 10 games to us.

But in total out of the 87 matches we've played, the stats look like this;

W: 37 L: 29 D: 21

Premiership form vs Form Chart

We currently are on a 5 game winning streak at the Riverside.

We've gone 7 games at home without a draw.

However, we haven't won in our previous 3 matches!

--

West Brom haven't won in their last 3 away matches.

--

BORO: W - L - W - L - L

ALBION: L - L - D - W - L

match predictions

I think Fortress Riverside will remain undefeated this week. Although our recent away defeats haven't spelled confidence, I'm hoping we have the ability to bounce back from the poor showings and romp to victory this weekend and so will Southgate.

We've looked pretty strong at home this season, and given West Brom's poor finishing so far this term, I'm going to definitely go for a Boro win.

Middlesbrough 2 - 0 West Brom