Watson bid is King for Boro!

Watson bid is King for Boro!

At long last the Boro have finally appeared to have woken up to the fact that the squad as it is now is simply not good enough to preserve Premier League football judging by the myriad of transfer talk surrounding the club this week.

The defeat at West Brom on Saturday left me feeling our chances of survival this season are nil and, while I feel it is time Gareth Southgate held up his hands and admitted that the grand plan to revolutionise the way we play and the make-up of our squad is clearly not working.

It seems he has lost the dressing room judging by the way players seem to be falling over themselves to get out, while the barrage of ‘Southgate Out’ talk on message boards and phone-ins following the Hawthorns debacle suggests the supporters’ patience has finally worn out!

The other side of the coin is Steve Gibson appointed Gareth and handed him a set of guidelines that must be adhered to, including a big reduction of the wage bill and to get costs down. Therefore he will no doubt stay loyal to his managerial selection, despite the football odds suggesting otherwise and when all around are calling for his head as he has done in the past with other managers.

Therefore with no changes at the very top it has been heartening to see the club are now likely to raid the emergency piggy bank to bring some reinforcements into the Riverside this month.

Ben Watson could hold the key to providing the killer balls to our strikers with his creativity in the centre and quality set-pieces, while he also chips in with the odd goal which is a vital asset lacking in our current middle men.

The young Englishman could be providing opportunities for a fellow compatriot in the shape of Wigan’s Marlon King if reports at the time of writing, which claim we will swap Mido for the former Watford man in a loan deal until the summer, are to be believed?

Personally I feel it would be a good move, albeit slightly risky, as King appears desperate for first-team football. So much so he has fallen out with current loan club Hull’s manager Phil brown after being left on the bench for the Arsenal game last Saturday!

Therein is the risk as we could be jumping out of the frying pan and into the fire by replacing King with Mido, but it is one I feel is worth taking at this moment in time.

Mido has shown he cannot be bothered at Boro with his ridiculous injury problems which always seem to pop up either the day before or hours before big games when it was likely that he would have to settle for a place on the bench.

King would be looking to prove himself all over again and, with a lack of real competition for a place in attack at Boro judging by our ‘goals for’ column, he would never get the chance to kick up a stink about being out of Gareth’s starting XI.

I would be fairly pleased if we pull off those two bits of business, while I feel another midfield enforcer and possibly another loan player should be brought in between now and February 2.


Written by Craig Smithson, a Middlesbrough season-ticket holder and a sports writer who blogs about football betting.

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