THE people of Teesside are passionate about their football, asserts Middlesbrough boss Tony Mowbray, but he concedes they have not been packing the Riverside in their droves this season.
Middlesbrough currently lie joint top of the Championship thanks to their unbeaten run of 13 league games which stretches back towards the end of last season.
Given the big improvement to the team’s fortunes since Mowbray’s arrival and their lofty position, you would think the fans would be beating down to get a ticket for the Riverside, but attendance figures so far this season show that in the five homes games played so far, Boro are averaging 17,564 through the turnstiles.
The current economic climate is no doubt having an effect on this but even so, the fact the club are not nudging past 20,000 might suggest that other factors are prevalent here.
The Gordon Strachan era was deflating for many supporters who had high hopes for a Premier League return, given his track record as a manager prior to his arrival and the big signings who graced the Riverside turf but failed to perform.
There will also be a generation of fans who until recently knew Boro as a Premier League club and nothing else, and still can’t comprehend their Championship status, vowing only to be back when ‘normal service’ in their minds is resumed.
Mowbray recognises all of those factors and while he would place himself as one of the die-hard 17,564 fans in order to get the rest back, the team must continue their fine work on the pitch.
He said: “Regarding the crowd, I’m very respectful of all the Middlesbrough supporters. I know there are tens of thousands at home reading the back pages, listening on the radio or watching Sky television to see the tickertape for the scores and they all want Boro to win.
“From my own point of view and being from the area, I don’t know everybody’s circumstances but I think people from Teesside are passionate about their football.
“The town and the supporters had such a great 10 or 11 years in the Premier League with world stars like Ravanelli, Juninho, Gascoigne and Emerson – the names keep rolling off your tongue – and I can understand to an extent that we’re not at that level anymore, yet I’m a big believer of new heroes coming along and new superstars being created.
“Whether he’s Brazilian or from Thornaby it shouldn’t matter, and I think we’re just on a journey to try and get to where we want to be and make people of the town be proud of their team again.
“There’s all types of different people. There are folk who’ll come to Boro matches even if we are in the third division because that’s what they do on Saturday afternoon.
“I fall into that category. When I’m 70 or 80 and living on Teesside, I’ll be wanting a season ticket for Boro. Even if they happen to be in the Conference by then, I’ll still be watching.
“But we are where we are. We have to keep going to try and build the club and all the staff have to work very hard to get the team back to where people want the team to be and expect it because there’s a generation of supporters who grew up with Middlesbrough in the Premier League.”
Mowbray is interested to see whether or not it is the Premier League generation that are staying away or even those who are long-term stalwarts.
Whatever the group – and their reasons – he will be very interested, should Boro get within touching distance of promotion, in their attendances.
He added: “I’m not stamping my feet demanding that they come. It’s the team winning and being top of the table that will hopefully get them back. As the season unfolds and we are 10 games away from the Premier League, I will be interested to see if we can get 25,000-30,000 or are we still getting 17,000.”
