By Watson and Warnock
December 15 2006

As I frustratingly thumped the table in front of me it struck me that Middlesbrough are more than capable of getting relegated. West Ham - a team below us in the league - now have Alan Curbishley as manager and it will not be long before they drag themselves out of the relegation dogfight.

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Watson says:

As I frustratingly thumped the table in front of me it struck me that Middlesbrough are more than capable of getting relegated. West Ham - a team below us in the league - now have Alan Curbishley as manager and it will not be long before they drag themselves out of the relegation dogfight.

How ironic.

Firstly Martin O'Neill could have ended up on Teesside but the prospect of working with our back room staff for longer than he wished proved to be the determinant factor. Then another manager Middlesbrough could have lured to the Riverside in Alan Curbishley ends up at a team that is also struggling. And what will happen? He will take them away from the bottom three.

Martin O'Neill has taken an average team, with no money, that was supposedly destined for relegation at the beginning of the season. Now they see themselves in the top half of the Premiership and chasing Europe. Wouldn't we like to be back there?

It's not that I am not a fan of Gareth Southgate; I feel I've made it perfectly clear on here that as long as he is our manager I will back him to the hilt. But we see ourselves sitting just above the relegation zone at Christmas and it is simply not good enough. Managers such as Aide Boothroyd would have set themselves targets of around twenty points at Christmas and the fact that we've not even reached this target sends butterflies to my stomach.

If we continue in this manner we will end up with a minimum of thirty-four points and that may not be enough to keep us in this division. The transfer window opens in a few weeks and if I'm honest I can't see many opportunities arising for us - I mean who wants to come to a team in our position? We can't win games at home or away, we can't fill our stadium, and I'm not sure we have a manager with a pedigree or the experience good enough to lure top-draw talent to the Riverside. So, what is it we can offer a player that the likes of West Ham, Wigan and even Newcastle can't?

With the rumours of Nugent's imminent arrival hitting the pages of the newspapers, it is clear that Southgate is trying his best to bring in some fresh faces. However, a player of Nugent's calibre may not be what we need right now. The bright lights of the Premiership may stun the 21 year old, who is yet to play to such a standard that befits the best league in the country and arguably the world.

He is barely playing his best for Preston at the moment and with so much pressure and hype he is failing to frequently hit the back of the net. Is this the player we want to be pinning our hopes on? I am worried that his lack of experience in top class football will affect the passion and motivation within the team and Nugent will just be a huge let down. With George Boateng failing to inspire the Boro masses so far this season, is a 21 year old who has no Premiership experience going to take the bull by the horns and spur us to victory, or at least to avoid relegation?

I am merely expressing my dislike in the possible signing of Nugent because I am worried the result still may not be good enough to save us at the moment. We have been linked with few other players and to be honest who is realistically available at the moment?

The reason we need a new striker is because our current strikers have not been playing to the standards we are used to. I'm not saying we should keep looking backwards at the way players were playing last season but the fact they have no consistency and in general haven't been scoring shows that changes do need to be made. We should be looking forward and not reminiscing on our previous glory.

Another problem we have is the lack of talent on the right wing. We need a player with pace and skill and it seems no player we bring in has this winning combination. If we have a wing-man that can take a loose ball from our own half and make something from it then our problems may be halved. If our current strikers receive better balls in the box then goals might come, and so might wins.

At the moment home wins are becoming harder and harder to get, but if we can't win at home then how can we have the basis and mind frame to win away? We need to get rid of this hoodoo belief that we can't win away, but if the team don't believe we can do it then how can we support them. I'm not saying we won't because those fans that attend every match or listen to every game will not just stop supporting the team, but we can't keep relying on home wins because they are becoming increasingly as sparse as away ones.

How are the team not being motivated before they go out on the pitch? The performances we give in the first half of matches aren't good enough. The team go out and don't play to their best, and as a result we are conceding more goals in the first half than any opposition. Goals change games and if we were to get that elusive first goal then maybe we can go on to win a game.

What is it with the just the one goal? We either lose out by a goal or scrape through on one goal. If we can get that first goal, then maybe it will set us up for a second. Maybe we should focus on working with the players we have, get ourselves more motivated and change things for the better. Maybe we can go to Craven Cottage with a new belief in our team, because lets face it things have got to start somewhere and soon.

Warnock says:

It's been a long time since the biggest talking point around the Riverside was the attendance. Unfortunately on Saturday we weren't revelling in a record high, but a record low. Low is a word we should get used to, in a period of traditional highs and festive cheer, prepare for a cold front to sweep through the Christmas period.

If you're not feeling festive, then you'd better get the tinsel out. Why? Because if eleven men in red and white suits can't deliver the goods then maybe the one with the beard can - and I don't mean Abel Xavier.

It is a worrying scenario when a milestone lowest-ever league attendance at the Riverside is justified by the result. Granted it was a game of two-halves and perhaps we deserved more than the point we salvaged, but we were only given a chance in the game because of a combination of top-class goalkeeping and poor finishing. The team must remember that a game lasts ninety minutes, and we must perform for those ninety minutes if we are to get what we need, especially at home.

It was good to see Yakubu grab a goal, and it wasn't the prettiest goal but it's what he and the team needs. We desperately need the Yak to stand up and be counted after netting only five so far this season. It was also encouraging to see Viduka and Morrison involved in the build-up, something we need more of. While the second half performance was slightly uplifting, the fact that we got a point at home to Wigan brings home the reality of our plight.

If we pepper a team's goal at home for forty-five minutes and yet still can't find a winning goal then who can we beat? Take away the Chelsea result, and we're sitting third bottom. Is this the next step after our UEFA Cup Final appearance? Is this progression? Or are we simply back where we were in 2003 before we won the Carling Cup?

The next five weeks are vital in determining in which direction this season will head. Unfortunately it's looking as if the two routes are either relegation at the very worst or realistically, upper bottom half at the very best.

In our next three games we face three teams who are within three points of us, above us and below. We also play Charlton twice in three weeks. Two defeats in those games could potentially put them a point above us. Frightening, isn't it - and what's more frightening is that there's a strong chance of that happening.

It's Fulham next, a game we could win on paper. Or then again perhaps not because on paper we haven't won any away games; all of which we should have won. That game is followed by the nerve jangling visit of Charlton and then another away game, not that it matters who we lose to but just for the record it's Everton that week.

In short, the Christmas fixtures are about as inspiring as a getting your eighth pair of socks on the 25th, and about as unsettling as turkey sandwiches on New Year's Day. If nothing else, the attendance should have served as a wake-up call to the club that this isn't good enough, and at this financially pressing time of the year fans will vote with their feet. Furthermore, a decent second half performance does nothing to paper over the ever-widening cracks. I re-iterate - it's just not good enough.

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