MIDDLESBROUGH'S Mark Viduka has joined the fast-growing Aiyegbeni Yakubu fan club by labelling the Nigerian an 'unbelievable' striker.

Yakubu's double in Sunday's 3-3 draw with Tottenham again made his £7.5m summer price-tag look a bargain.

Despite being in competition with two more senior international centre-forwards - Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink and Viduka - the 23-year-old has become manager Steve McClaren's only automatic choice.

McClaren has identified his expensive close-season recruit as the one man out of the three forwards who is being saved for the Premiership.

Yakubu has found the net ten times already in the top-flight and only Ruud van Nistelrooy and Frank Lampard have scored more.

The former Portsmouth striker is likely to be rested again for tomorrow's Carling Cup quarter-final tie with Blackburn - provided Hasselbaink recovers from a slight calf niggle that kept him out of Sunday's draw - in preparation for the hectic Christmas programme.

Viduka, for one, is not surprised. "I played against him at Portsmouth and I always rated him," said Viduka.

"He is an unbelievable player. He has ten or 11 goals, if you include his UEFA Cup goal, and that's up there with the best.

"In training he is very strong and shows his quick feet every day. He is also a great finisher.

"It was always clear he was going to be good for us. He had it hard at first but he soon got over that and we are seeing him at his best.

"The competition for places he has brought is not a worry. The more quality players you have the better."

The three strikers have contributed 22 goals between them this season - only Chelsea and Arsenal have scored more goals than Boro on home soil in the Premiership.

But the 15 they have scored at the Riverside have not resulted in as many victories as McClaren would have liked.

Defence was always Boro's strong point under the former Manchester United No 2 and Viduka believes he knows why there has been such a dramatic shift.

"Middlesbrough were always a team that would go to places, even at home to be fair, and defend because they were inferior. Now it's a different story," he said.

"People take notice of Middlesbrough and teams come to us and we have to break them down, they respect us more. They are expecting us to attack. If you play on the counter-attack and you win 1-0 you run risks. We try to make the play now."

As well as playing in Australia's first World Cup campaign in 32 years next summer, 30-year-old Viduka would love nothing more than to go there as a cup winner.

He has won two Australian championships with Melbourne Knights, four league titles and three Super Cups with Croatia Zagreb and the CIS Insurance Cup with Celtic.

But, during five years in England, he has yet to put his hands on any silverware.

Boro are in the quarter-finals of the Carling Cup, through to the last 32 of the UEFA Cup and do not kick-start their latest FA Cup campaign until January 7 at Nuneaton Borough.

Viduka said: "A World Cup and Carling Cup double would be great. A treble with the UEFA Cup would be even better.

"We all want to play in front of 50-70,000 people in big finals."

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