Times change both quickly and dramatically in football, and they certainly have at the Boro.
Five seasons ago Boro trounced Ipswich 3-1 at the Riverside with six players in their starting line-up who had come through the club’s famed Academy.
The sextet were Tony McMahon, Andrew Taylor, David Wheater, Seb Hines, Rhys Williams and Adam Johnson.
A seventh Academy lad, Jonathan Grounds, later came off the bench.
How this will compare to the Boro side which lines up against Ipswich Town in the massive six-pointer on Teesside this Saturday, we do not know.
But there was only one Boro Academy lad in the side which took Millwall apart in the team’s last home game, and that was Ben Gibson.
You would always want every Boro manager to select his best team. Whatever their background.
But it’s certainly an interesting situation, and one which is not typical throughout the club’s history.
Even the 2006 UEFA Cup final team contained three Boro Academy lads.
Boro U21s coach Paul Jenkins.
The legendary Middlesbrough heritage of producing home-grown stars – think of Wilf Mannion, George Hardwick, Brian Clough, Willie Maddren and Stewart Downing among many dozens of top players – is not in evidence at first team level at the moment.
Yet, I wouldn’t think of taking anything away from the current youth set-up at Rockliffe Park.
The category one Academy is run magnificently, while there are some great coaches involved.
If you were the father of an aspiring young footballer, you wouldn’t want your son to go anywhere but Rockliffe Park.
Boro’s Under-21s are enjoying a superb season, while the Under-18s have just won their league. The Academy is working at the same level of intensity as ever.
Maybe one obvious difference between the current situation and the one from five years ago is that Karanka is under no pressure to consider promoting young players ahead of their time.
Despite having just one Teessider in his regular line-up, Karanka’s team is faring better than any Boro team for several years.
In any case there are many differences in the demands of the modern game from times gone by.
In the days of Wilf and George, it was vital to produce your own players to support the outsiders who were brought in to bolster the team.
In Wilf’s time, every young lad played football on street corners and clubs were spoilt for choice.
Nowadays a much smaller percentage of youngsters dream of becoming professional footballers, which increases demands on scouting, selection and development.
Another point worth mentioning is that the surfeit of young players who have represented the Boro over the past ten years tended to come from the same crop.
Boro won the FA Youth Cup in 2004 with a quite remarkable squad, the likes of which we will probably never see again at the club.
Think of James Morrison and Matthew Bates in addition to the players mentioned earlier, while Lee Cattermole was one of the subs in the two-legged final against Aston Villa.
James Morrison
The Boro gained great service from many of the kids from that era.
In fact, the likes of McMahon, Wheater, Gary Liddle, Taylor, Bates, Morrison, Jason Kennedy, Tom Craddock, Adam Johnson, Cattermole and Hines are all still playing professional football.
With Downing only slighter older than those lads, it was a one-off dream scenario for any club.
And, maybe it’s a sign of the times that Williams and Hines are the only ones from this group still contracted to the Boro.
Rhys is fighting another long battle to regain fitness, while Seb is currently on loan at Orlando City.
And it’s not that Karanka hasn’t been afraid to promote the young lads when he feels the time is right.
Gibson’s dramatic improvement this season has been there for all to see.
The 22-year-old from Nunthorpe has worked his way through the different Academy levels and also benefitted greatly from several spells out on loan, before returning to Boro ready to hold down a regular place.
All being well, Gibson is going to be a rock solid member of the side for many years to come. You certainly wouldn’t harbour any doubts about his ability to adapt to life in the Premier League.
Two other home-grown lads were in the Boro squad which beat Millwall. Adam Reach has established himself as a regular under Karanka and is developing into a quality left-sided midfielder.
Goalkeeper Connor Ripley has not played for the first team for three seasons, having come in on two consecutive occasions as a teenager and performed with credit.
At the age of 22, Connor is probably closer to the first team than he has been for a long time and recently earned some special praise from Karanka.
Another who has featured this season is 19-year-old striker Bradley Fewster, who played in the opening two Capital One Cup ties at the start of the campaign.
Bryn Morris and Bradley Fewster
There’s also 18-year-old midfielder Bryn Morris, who has notched two league appearances for the Boro and recently enjoyed a successful loan spell at Burton Albion.
I suspect that none of the talented young lads will be held back and will get their chance if the opportunity comes along.
It’s worth pointing out that Millwall also had just one Academy player in their team which lined up against the Boro 11 days ago. He was Dublin-born skipper Alan Dunne.
In a perfect world I would love to see a successful Boro side containing more home-grown stars, but then I also want to see Boro back in the Premier League, winning the FA Cup, getting back into Europe and filling the Riverside every fortnight etc.
Five seasons ago, the Boro fans had high hopes that Gareth Southgate’s Academy-thronged Boro side would prove good enough to fire Boro back to the Premier League at the first attempt.
Boro had just been relegated from the top flight but won three of the opening four games and drew the other, without conceding a goal.
They lost for the first time in their fifth game, 2-1 at Bristol City, and so went into the game at home to Roy Keane’s Ipswich in September, 2009, needing to get back to winning ways.
Southgate’s side was: Coyne; McMahon, Wheater, Hines, Taylor; O’Neil, Williams, Arca, Johnson; Emnes, Lita. Subs: Jones, Hoyte, Grounds, Bennett, Franks, Yeates, Aliadiere.
Boro were handed a dream start when O’Neil headed in from an Emnes cross.
But afterwards they made hard work of things.
Adam Johnson and Jeremie Aliadiere celebrate against Ipswich
However Jeremie Aliadiere replaced Leroy Lita on the hour and scored twice in 20 minutes, first when heading in a cross from Johnson and then netting with a solo effort.
Jon Walters, who was sold on to Stoke City at the end of that season, scored a late consolation penalty for Ipswich.
The win took Boro into second place in the Championship, one point behind West Brom, but hopes of enjoying a successful season gradually dwindled.
Southgate was sacked the following month and Boro fell away badly under new boss Gordon Strachan.
While the vast majority of players from that Boro win against Ipswich have long since moved on, the onus rests with Karanka’s side to repeat the victory on Saturday, albeit in more testing circumstances.
Ipswich were second bottom following their Riverside defeat five seasons ago, but come here this weekend - like Boro – with winning promotion very much on their minds.
Boro didn’t cover themselves in glory when suffering defeat at Portman Road just before Christmas, so hopefully there’ll be no more presents handed out on this occasion.
A Boro win will send the fans home happy and hopefully give a clear indication to the current set of Academy players of the levels they must attain if they want to become regular first team squad members.
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