Boro's shot at redemption

Tuesday's FA Cup win over Nuneaton helped to settle a few nerves but, with last weekend's Highbury humiliation still casting a menacing shadow over the Riverside, atonement remains an over-riding ambition ahead of this afternoon's game. Nobody will be moving on until the demons are put to rest.

It is easy to become blas about the footballing mindset. Multi-million pound salaries, top-of-the-range cars and vast country estates undoubtedly help to soften the blow of a bad day on the pitch but, in and around Boro's Rockliffe Park training ground this week, one thing has been starkly apparent. Last weekend's defeat hurt.

Maybe not in a career-changing way, but certainly in a powerful enough fashion to alter the mood of an entire football club. Clearly, damaged pride can still affect the most pampered of professionals.

Yet, for one player, recovering from the most harrowing of on-field setbacks is nothing new. In 1996, Gareth Southgate gained infamy as the man who cost England a place in the final of the European Championships. Ten years on, though, and his penalty miss against Germany is a footnote in an otherwise successful career.

Hard as it may be to believe at the moment, the Boro skipper is confident that last weekend's seven-goal humbling will eventually seem similarly insignificant to Steve McClaren's squad.

"I've been involved in bad times before," said Southgate, who was relegated with Crystal Palace in the early stages of his career.

"I've had disappointments and heavy defeats, and it is always possible to turn things round. The important thing is not to lose sight of that fact.

"I would say this is one of the lowest points of my career because we started this season with such high expectations.

"But I have been in football long enough to know that there are highs and lows and you have to deal with them both. You can't expect your career to be one long fairytale because, just as there are winners in football, so there are losers as well."

At first, it seems strange to hear Southgate talking of the fall-out from a defeat in which he did not even play a part.

He was not in London as his team-mates were crashing to Boro's heaviest defeat for more than half a century, but that has done nothing to lessen the pain of everything that has followed.

The 35-year-old is a skipper in every sense of the word, with concepts such as unity and shared responsibility still meaning something to the way he views the game.

Consequently, when he claims "I was not down there, but I was certainly down", it is impossible to question the authenticity of the sentiment.

"When something like that happens, it affects the whole club," explained Southgate. "As a player, there are inevitably going to be times when you are not involved and, when the team plays well or wins, you don't really feel like a full part of it.

"When something like that happens, though, it is impossible to put it to one side. I'm sure it affected everybody - the lads who were playing, the injured players like me, the coaches, the fans and the tea lady.

"We were in training on Sunday morning and I felt that it was my job to try to lift everybody for Tuesday. It certainly wasn't easy, but it was important we tried to stay positive.

"Last weekend has to be a watershed for us. It was certainly a low point, but we need to make sure things don't get any lower.

"That has to be as bad as things are going to get and, from there, we have to sort out some of the issues that are in existence at the moment. Collectively, we need to push forward and get ourselves up the table."

That process begins today, with Boro attempting to cultivate a sense of stability amidst the chaos that still seems to be swirling around the Riverside.

Mark Schwarzer's transfer situation has been turned on its head, McClaren and chairman Steve Gibson are pulling in different directions with regard to the purchase of new players and rumours of a dressing-room split refuse to disappear.

Add an impending relegation battle into the equation and you are left with a dangerously volatile mix.

"It's been an unsettled time," admitted Southgate. "But the thing that has unsettled us more than anything else has been the results. We haven't managed to win in the league now and that is the thing that affects the mood and the optimism more than anything else.

"Unfortunately, because transfer business has to be done in the short period of time that the window is open, there tends to be an intensity of focus this month.

"From the outside, it does seem as though things are very unsettled, but I think that's true of any club at the moment. As a club, we have to try to keep that in order."

At least a semblance of normality would be restored if Middlesbrough were to beat Wigan this afternoon.

The extent of last weekend's defeat understandably grabbed the headlines, but the mere fact it extended the club's winless league run to a startling eight games should have been enough to set alarm bells ringing.

Tuesday night's 5-2 win over Nuneaton maintained this season's impressive run of form in the cups, but progress in both domestic and European competitions will count for little if Boro's Premiership form does not improve. After all, the Teessiders know better than most that cup success is not a vaccine against relegation.

"The cup runs are nice," said Southgate. "But the Premiership has to be the most important thing because that is how you are judged as a team.

"At the moment, it doesn't make for very pretty reading for us.

"But this is a division that is very, very tight. If we get results in our next two or three games - which we need to do - the picture will change very quickly."