Tony Mowbray's guide to gardening!
The pre-season favourites for promotion to the Premiership have found themselves embroiled in a relegation scrap that could involve upto a dozen clubs.
Avoiding relegation is the new target at The Riverside Stadium with Mowbray leaning on his recent horticultural experience to explain things to the ‘Boro fans.
David Wheater and Gary O’Neil were sold in January to reduce the club’s wage bill with high earners such as Scott McDonald, Stephen McManus and Kris Boyd likely to be the next casulaties.
Middlesbrough fans are known for their straight talking but rather than deliver a cost cutting speech the former Celtic boss has decided to address the issue with more flowery language.
“The analogy I would generally give is cutting down a bush, a big tree that is overgrown,” Mowbray explained. “You have to cut it down, get it back to a base and let it grow again.
“We are not cutting the tree off at the base and just leaving a stump in the ground, we are trying to prune the bush down before it can start growing again. But in football management, you have got to win games as you are doing it.
“We are trying to weaken our team, continue to win games, stay in this league, then grow back again and be a team that’s a real force in this league, hopefully get back to the Premier League.
“Then in the right manner spend the money well on good players, stay in the league, get the resources and hopefully Middlesbrough in however many years’ time can get back to where it was for so many years.”
There won’t be much scope for sowing seeds on Saturday when Mowbray takes his shears to The New Den to face Millwall.
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