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Mowbray can't prevent Middlesbrough hitting rock bottom

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Tony Mowbray’s return to Middlesbrough ended in disappointment with Bristol City’s win leaving ‘Boro at the bottom of the table alongside George Burley’s Crystal Palace.

The former Celtic boss was given a heroes reception at the Riverside Stadium and things looked to be going to plan when Kris Boyd netted against David James.

Boyd was set up for his goal by Scott McDonald with Stephen McManus and Barry Robson also in the starting line up.

Bristol City equalised before half time through Albert Adomah then silenced the home fans when Marvin Elliot scored with a 25-yarder four minutes after the break.

The win lifted City away from bottom place to leave and sent Boro to their fourth consecutive defeat.

Mowbray admitted: “Of course it was disappointing, I would have liked to have started my time as manager here with points on the board but I’ve got to take the positives from the game.

“We controlled the game for long spells, we pinned them down and created a lot of chances, not just half-chances but really good opportunities of the sort that Kris Boyd and Scott McDonald have made a career out of putting away.

“I think the shot count was 24 to five in our favour and we created five or six good goalscoring opportunities.

“If we can maintain that kind of work-rate and keep creating chances like that then we will not lose too many games. But the only statistic that counts is that we lost 2-1.

“The concerning thing is that after they scored the second goal – which was a superb strike – we lost our fluency for a while and it was only in the last 15 or 20 minutes that we started to put the pressure on again.”

Like Gordon Strachan the early signs are that Mowbray will continue in the veign that he managed Celtic.

With 11 points from 14 matches the former ‘Boro captain needs to shore up his defence and start scrapping out some draws, maybe even learning how to win ugly.

During his time at Celtic Mowbray seemed obsessed with some master plan to play football of a certain style.

Whether it’s at Middlesbrough or Celtic the first requirement of any manager is to put a team on the park that is hard to beat and winning regardless of the style- once that’s being achieved Mowbray can indulge in the type of football that he seems fascinated by.

Steven Craven to speak out

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0 comments

  • greenjedi says:

    Joe you missed out a line from his statement where he said “We’ll take it on the chin and move on!”

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