Boro’s plight a rerun of vital end to season back in 1997
SURVIVAL IS STILL THE WATCHWORD
BORO will find themselves at a crossroads if and when the season resumes.
Whether Jonathan Woodgate’s men maintain their existence in the Championship, or face the prospect of dropping into football’s third tier, will have a marked effect on the whole direction and future of the club.
It will dictate if Boro can initialise plans to push forwards, or need to cut costs dramatically and face a period of treading water as they fight to stabilise the ship.
This was exactly the case when Boro lined up for their derby clash against Leeds United at Elland Road in the early summer of 1997.
Victory against Leeds offered the Boro a chance to rubber stamp their impressive plans for the future, which could have taken them to the verge of football’s elite.
A draw or a defeat would leave the club relegated to Division One, needing a major rethink and demanding severe cost-cutting.
It was the season of Fabrizio Ravanelli, Juninho and Emerson, of course, the two cup finals and the controversial three-point deduction.
How it ever reached the do-or-die last stand of Elland Road is a matter of huge conjecture.
The three superstars may claim that the club was not quite ready for the big time because the squad as a whole was not good enough.
The rest of the squad may believe that it was not always easy playing alongside three world stars who had been placed on a pedestal by the club, the media and the fans.
As a result, the team’s fortunes on matchday depended heavily on what the three stars could produce. The matchday plans were heavily weighted towards them.
If Juninho and Emerson were shut down and could not make things happen, then Ravanelli didn’t see the ball and the ball didn’t go into the net.
We tend to remember the season as one of wonderful football from beginning to end, yet when the team blew cold, they struggled.
Even so, the overriding factor which left Boro in their perilous position as they headed for Leeds was the deduction of the three points.
The points were taken from the club by the FA after they failed to fulfil a Premier League fixture at Blackburn Rovers just before Christmas.
I had gone to see Bryan Robson early on the Friday morning and he was tearing his hair out. An horrendous run of injuries and illness had left him in an almighty dilemma because he could not pick a representative team.
I suspected that other moves might be afoot. So I went back to the club at lunchtime to discover that Boro had informed the FA that the match was off because they did not have enough players.
The national criticism which followed Boro’s decision was both severe and surprising, with Blackburn adding their two-pennyworth.
Even though Boro felt that the FA had originally accepted the situation and the game’s postponement, the FA responded to the criticism and deducted Boro three points.
Legal representations followed and the matter ended up in the High Court. Unfortunately, Boro lost the case, and the penalty was allowed to stand.
The Blackburn game was eventually played as the penultimate match of the campaign, on a Thursday evening in early May.
By that time Boro had played in one cup final and were preparing for another, but were perilously close to dropping out of the top flight.
Robbo’s men could still virtually guarantee survival by beating
Rovers,
though the home side were not safe either.
Boro were without the injured Ravanelli, who had scored 31 goals in all competitions during the season, so Mikkel Beck came in to lead the attack.
In the event Robbo’s men held the balance of play but could not find the back of the net and had to settle for a point from a goalless draw.
So everything now depended on Boro’s ability to lift themselves for a mammoth last gasp effort at Leeds.
Boro fans left Teesside in pouring rain to head to Elland Road, though the weather brightened up on the way and it was bright sunshine all afternoon.
Ravanelli was still not fit to return, so Robson named an unchanged side.
Leeds had not enjoyed the greatest of seasons, but they were a few points clear of the relegation battle.
The home side were particularly strong from an attacking point of view, with Ian Rush and Brian Deane firing the missiles and Lee Bowyer and Lee Sharpe providing the ammunition.
The match was incredibly tense from the start. Both sides were hotly competitive but there was not a lot of goal-mouth action in the first half.
The nearest we came to a goal was when Bowyer scuffed a shot wide of the right hand post from a close-in position.
The nerves were even jangling in the Press room at the interval and we journalists struggled to enjoy our chicken in barbecue sauce with green pasta – a nice touch in the days when clubs usually provided only a few sandwiches. The game continued in the same pattern in the second half. Robson made an early change when bringing on Vladimir Kinder at left-back and pushing Clayton Blackmore into midfield in place of Craig Hignett.
Boro were cut up by one quick Leeds break when Derek Lilley got the ball into the net. However, Boro were able to breathe again when the offside flag was raised.
With 20 minutes to go Robbo made another change by taking off the ineffective Emerson and bringing on Chris Freestone to play up front alongside Beck.
It was one of those games in which Boro had needed Emerson to produce his special qualities but we saw none of them and the game effectively passed him by.
Boro were gradually raising the tempo but it was Leeds who broke the deadlock 11 minutes from time. Substitute Danny Wallace crossed from the right and Deane placed a deft header into the right hand corner and just out of reach of the diving Ben Roberts.
Robbo’s men kept their heads up and levelled three minutes later with a terrific goal from Juninho.
The Brazilian whizz kid ran at the Leeds defence and cut in from the left before rifling a low drive into the right hand corner which took a slight deflection off Bowyer.
The last few minutes were all Boro, with Leeds encamped in their own half. But the goal which Boro needed just would not come. The iconic footage of Juninho sitting weeping on the pitch after the final whistle is one which will stick long in Boro fans’ memories.
Robson retained a stiff upper lip at the Press conference which followed but was clearly gutted.
I went to see him at Rockliffe Park the following morning and he was honest enough to talk about his plans for the next season which had gone up in smoke.
There were irons in the fire to bring in three world-class players that summer, which included Roberto Carlos and possibly Miguel Angel Nadal.
Put these three new boys alongside Ravanelli, Emerson and Juninho, and Boro would have had some team.
However, these ambitious plans had now gone out of the window.
In the event, Ravanelli and Juninho were to leave the club very quickly. Nevertheless, Robson worked wonders to turn things around and take the club back into the Premier League at the first attempt.
However, in a rapidly changing world where the big clubs were growing bigger at a dramatic rate, Boro were never to get back to the verge of the heady heights as they were when they went to Elland Road in 1997.
The message is that you must make the best of every opportunity which comes your way because one step backwards can set the club back for a long, long time.
You must make the best
of every opportunity which comes your way
because one step backwards can set the club back for a long,
long time