I'VE BEEN out of the loop for a few days. What have I missed? You know how quickly the emotional temperature changes on Planet Boro with every unfolding detail. I won't know whether to practice my booing or book hotels in the North London area for FA Cup final weekend.
Shall we rattle the recent developments off?
New sponsor: a world leading hi-tech satellite communications company stumping up "a seven figure" fee. A go-ahead, visionary new brand at the start of what it hopes is a period of expansion that will make it a market leader. You can't argue with that. Well, you can, but it would seem daft. Given the previous deals Boro have had this one is a cracker.
The first of the modern era was a ground breaking £3m over ten years stadium naming rights and shirt deal with Cellnet that tied Boro in just as the name game inflation was about to rocket and was ended early as the company was broken up. That was followed by the eleventh hour undisclosed but reputedly cut-price arrangement with mobile bucketshop Dial-a-Phone, a deal sealed so late that the shirts were in the shops and iron on transfers of the logo were dished out at the club shop. Then came the 888.com sponsorship, estimated at £700,000 a year, a price that proved a bargain for the cyber-gambling firm as in the first season Boro played what felt like their first 20 matches on the box and in the second served up a pulsating run to Eindhoven.
So to bounce back from an unseemly delay and lost shirt shelf life to secure a hefty increase in income from a far more dynamic, and certainly less morally problematic brand, must count as a success.
New shirts: I would never claim to be a fashionista and frankly the idea of assessing something as gaudy, mass produced and unflattering as a football shirt within any kind of haute couture consciouness is just plain daft - "polyester is soooo last year" - but I think it is a major step back to lose something as vividly obvious as a branding statement as the white band. Whatever short term gain there is in sales - three years of the band may have slightly depressed the sales and a new look may help there - the long term loss of such a visible statement of identity, especially that created after Europe, will harder to claw back.
As for impressions of the new kit itself, well, people may say it looks like Liverpool or Bristol City but to me with the piping and the new shape badge it looks a bit like, well, Wales. The away kit is an abomination. Gold shorts? Pans' People Roller Disco Hell!
Friendlies: Glorified kickabouts have next to no impact on the season. The games in German were strange choices made more bizarre by live TV coverage although the "bonding" element shouldn't be under-estimated. Ideally the early outings should always be trips to local Northern League outfits, a chance for supporters to check out the new signings and new haircuts at leisure combined with a bridge-building exercise with grassroots clubs who could really do with the gate money.
That said mighty Boro remain unbeaten in domestic competition so far this season after a Yak penalty earned a 1-1 draw at Burnley in which potentially the most exciting thing was a minor electrical fire near the press box which was dealt with in sober fashion by the new matchday microphone monopolists of the Beeb. Imagine the hysterical hyperbole if Ali Brownlee had been covering it. Meanwhile Tom Craddock got both in last night's 2-0 win at Darlington. Almost half the 4,300 crowd at the George Reynolds' Folly were Boro fans which is a decent turnout at this stage.
Luke Young - Spectacular? Far from it. He is more a Steady Eddie - but as an experienced Premier League and occasional England defender at less than half the pricetag being quoted for unproven Leighton Baines he will represent a solid and professional bit of business when he signs for £2.5m - which seems likely as he has stuck around long enough for his medical and to watch his prospective team-mates in action aganist the Quakers.
Young is exactly the kind of player Boro need - young enough, talented enough and hungry enough to form part of the new culture that Gareth Southgate is building for years to come. He is a long term prospect in a way that Abel Xavier was not, a specialist right-back in a way that Andrew Davies can never claim to be and is of the proven top-flight injury-free quality that as yet Tony McMahon can only dream about.
For me he is exactly the profile of player that Boro should be going for. We do not want G-14 cast-offs who arrive reluctantly bringing their baggage and bitterness to shatter the wage structure and dressing room morale. Neither do we want over-priced potential, speculating with stupid money and hope that the Championship darling is not a one season wonder. We want proven Premiership professionals who like the club are unfashionable but ambitious, who want to rise to the challenge of proving their ability as part of a team playing good football.
Sadly such excellent purchases will not satisfy everyone, especially those who have now persuaded themselves that anything less than Riquelme will be a betrayal. The "spectacular" statement - always risky - now threatens to come back and bite Boro in the bum as it is sharpened ready to be used as a stick to beat the club with.
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