Middlesbrough travel to Lancashire to face fellow play-off hopefuls Blackburn tonight in what could prove to be a crucial match for both sides. A win for Boro could potentially leave them in fifth place come the end of the week, should results go their way.
However, even though Blackburn are winless in six and have lost four in a row, the Teessiders do not have a good record against Rovers. They have only beat them once in the last five years thanks to a Riley McGree wondergoal after a complete capitulation from Blackburn early in the second half. Blackburn will be hopeful heading into this match, being at home and considering their record against Boro, many would not be surprised with Blackburn emerging victorious tonight, which would be a real blow to Middlesbrough’s chances of making the play-offs.
Looking at Boro’s squad, fans will be happy to hear that more central defenders are coming closer to being available for selection, with Michael Carrick resorting to using full-back Neto Borges and veteran midfielder Johnny Howson as his central defensive partnership. Rav Van Den Berg’s late appearance against Oxford will give fans hope that they will have some more experienced defenders for the truly crucial games coming up.
Even more importantly for Middlesbrough, they will most definitely need the confidence of a win heading into their midweek fixture against a high-flying, albeit wobbling, Leeds United, who beat the Boro 3-1 in the reverse fixture. A Middlesbrough win tonight would give fans a lot more hope heading into Tuesday night.
For tonight, Carrick will just be hoping to get the win to set themselves up nicely for the remaining games of the season, with good form needed to make the play-offs come May.
The play-off race is well and truly on and heating up by the week. The three top teams, Leeds, Burnley and Sheffield United, look to have cemented themselves as the top three, but the order in which they finish is still up for debate, with one of the teams missing out on automatic promotion. Sunderland seem to be fairly safe in fourth position as they are nine points behind third and 13 points ahead of fifth, with no signs that this will change in the remaining seven games. The battle for the remaining two play-off places goes all the way down to 13th place, where Millwall currently sit on 51 points.
In reverse order, the teams back up to fifth are as follows: Sheffield Wednesday (52), Blackburn Rovers (52), Norwich (52), Watford (53), Bristol City (57), Middlesbrough (57), West Brom (57) and Coventry (59). With 21 points still up for grabs, any of these teams could conceivably end up in the top six. With plenty of these teams playing each other in the coming weeks, this will only make it more interesting.
Ultimately, focusing on tonight’s fixture at Ewood Park, TUXtra collectively predicts a nervy 2-1 win for the Boro, putting them in fifth come the end of the night.
