Join the club.

[morty]

Middlesboro join the elite club of four football teams that have been relegated from the Premiership four times now.

Boro, us, Sunderland and Palace.

Interestingly familiar article here :-

http://www.skysports.com/football/news/11680/10869952/aitor-karanka-should-have-lost-middlesbrough-job-earlier-says-john-hendrie

 

[Scott]

Haha, a club that no one wants to be a part of

 

[morty]

Gotta be in it to win it!

I bet Ipswich would love to be....

 

[Scott]

That's true, I am surprised there isn't more teams in there to be honest - there's always teams like Burnley, Hull etc going up and down

 

[Canaryboy]

It was a bit weird how he didn't give Rhodes or Nugent a proper run in the team when they couldn't score for toffee, shipped them out and then spent £6m on Patrick Bamford who hadn't scored a goal for over 18 months.

Possibly a bit more understandable with Nugent because its already been established that he is one of those inbetweenie players who is never going to pull up trees in the Premier League (like Jerome I guess), but it was silly not giving Rhodes a run of games... considering how many big target men have successfully made the step up in recent years, e.g. Holt, Lambert, Austin, Ings, Ulloa. 

And Rhodes may get the chance to show how stupid that decision was next season. Think Rhodes got 2 starts and Nugent got 0  ... Not sure what Bamford has done to deserve his 4th crack at a Premier League side in 2 seasons, its 0 in 24 for him now. He's the English Van Wolfswinkel. 

 

[morty]

Karanka was quite defensive minded in the Championship too. Its weird as I have a mate who was telling me how Boro were going to do it the right way, and citing their ambition.

And really their season ended up exactly the same way our last few in the Premiership did.

But yeah, pretty daft buying strikers you have no intention of playing. And buying Bamford at all. Didn't they pay a fair bit for him too?

 

[Canaryboy]

He pretty much tried to play like Chris Hughton did in our relegation season, which explains why he wants those "complete striker" or "false nine" types and sneered his nose up at an old fashioned target man like Rhodes. Funny how Burnley will stay up with that big lump Sam Vokes leading the line, who has never scored anywhere near as many goals as Rhodes in the Championship. 

They were a bit unlucky to lose Daniel Ayala to injury for about two thirds of the season though, he was a donkey for us but was their best defender last season and in the Champs team of the year. 

 

[Canaryboy]

Bit torn about whether or not I want Swansea to go down. On one hand I'd quite like to see Leroy Fer achieve his third relegation in his third Premier League season, because I never took to him. Appreciated his technical ability but marred by his general laziness. On the other hand I don't begrudge Martin Olsson success, would be a shame to see him come straight back down. He didn't owe us anything. 

 

[Canaryboy]

Scrap that, don't want Swansea down, probably more likely to get their sh*t together in this league next season than Hull .