Hugill fit as a fiddle and ready to fight for target man spot
JORDAN Hugill is finally on the verge of the big breakthrough with the club he loves.
The 26-year-old former Nunthorpe schoolboy is fully fighting fit again and ready to challenge Britt Assombalonga for the Boro’s target man role.
That’s exactly what manager Tony Pulis wants to see as he continues his battle to turn the Boro into the strong men of the Championship.
Pulis has created hot competition for places throughout his defence and in midfield, but has been short of options up front.
When Hugill arrived at the Riverside on a season-long loan from West Ham United, he was still carrying a hamstring injury which wrecked his pre-season.
At the time, Pulis stressed that it could be mid-September before Hugill was challenging for a place in the starting line-up. The forecast looks spot on.
Hugill could even be pitched straight into the fray at Norwich City next Saturday.
If so, the former Dickens Inn barman will no doubt be busting a gut to try to make the position his own.
Hugill has worked his way up through football the hard way, plying his trade with various non-league sides before finally making his professional breakthrough with Port Vale in 2013.
Since then he has knuckled down and gradually worked his way up the ladder. His outstanding form with Preston led to January’s £10m move to West Ham.
Hugill was never really given a chance by the Hammers, but now the door is wide open again as he resurrects his career with his home town
club.
He has already begun to regain his match fitness, scoring his first goal for the Boro in the Carabao Cup victory against Rochdale.
Hugill is now ready to go in a head to head with Britt Assombalonga for the role of target man. If he can show that the ball sticks to his feet – and also score a few goals – he could earn the nod.
Whoever wins the battle hardly matters to Pulis. The manager is in a win-win situation just to have lively competition for such a crucial role in the side.
Naturally Assombalonga has done nothing wrong so far this season. He’s played as well as ever for the club and scored two goals.
Clearly he’s done more to impress Pulis than he did last season, when he was overlooked for much of the time in favour of Patrick Bamford.
It’s debatable whether Pulis would have sanctioned the £8m move of Bamford to Leeds if he had known that the Boro would fail to sign all his attacking targets before the transfer window closed.
That’s allied to the fact that the club’s other target man, Rudy Gestede, is still sidelined through injury, while Ashley Fletcher still has something to prove.
So Hugill’s green light is a breath of fresh air. The ball is firmly in his court if he wants to battle to establish himself with his home town club.
Assombalonga can claim to have a more impressive career goals record than Hugill, though both players are strong on the ball and have decent aerial power.
In any case Pulis selects those players who he feels best fit into his team pattern. So Hugill may yet emerge pretty quickly as the main man.
Pulis has already been forced to change the side’s general pattern of play because of the club’s failure to sign any wingers during the summer.
But so far the wing-back system has worked to the team’s benefit, while Martin Braithwaite’s failure to get away has been another bonus.
Braithwaite has been like a new signing this season and is currently top scorer with three goals.
The Dane’s presence has forced a slight change of shape because Braithwaite is an orthodox No.10, which is something which Pulis might not initially have planned for.
Yet, it arguably works in the team’s favour because Boro now have two potential goalscorers in the middle rather than one.