Michael Carrick was full of fire during his recent Middlesbrough press conference.
During a brief press conference, Middlesbrough manager Michael Carrick expressed confidence while facing pressure.
Carrick, who is usually Mr Calm, changed on Wednesday at Rockliffe as he prepared to face Bristol City on Friday. It was welcome. The Boro boss was motivated to improve the club’s performance and return them to play-off contention. These were encouraging comments.
Perspective was the keyword of the day. When asked about the need for change, he used it eight times to emphasise his argument. It comes after a record of only three wins in 15 games and four straight losses. After a week of criticism, the Boro manager was backed by Steve Gibson and the club’s administration, who had ‘no intentions for change’.
“Perspective is important, especially to me,” Carrick stressed. “Understanding what’s required, what will help us avoid overthinking, over-analyzing, and over-playing it. This isn’t always effective.
“We still have a tremendous chance in front of us, and we have to seize the moment, suck it up, and get on with it. Moving ahead, we really need to use that as a fire. We have incredibly good players, and I believe we have a really solid squad.
“So, again, I’ve sat here in the previous week or two weeks and said things, and my feelings haven’t changed. I have a lot of faith in the boys, and I believe that if and when we get it right, we’ll be OK.
Perspective was an interesting thing to emphasise. The truth is that Carrick’s future is uncertain because Boro are 11th in the Championship despite significant investment in what appears to be a good side. He agreed that the season-start target was top two, and as rivals Sunderland have shown, there was no reason why Boro couldn’t have been in the top four in a weaker Championship field. They aren’t, and they won’t be, therefore there’s no point in lamenting what has already happened.
Instead, Boro are battling for a top-six berth and, despite their record, are only four points behind the play-offs with a game in hand against Stoke City on Tuesday night. With wins over Bristol City and Stoke City, Boro’s view on the final 12 games changes dramatically.
“It’s perspective again of where we are in this situation,” the Boro manager remarked. “We wanted to be further up in the league. We wanted to be challenging for something a little closer to the top. But if we’re talking about play-offs, there are four spaces available, and we’re in touch.
“Fourteen games is a lot of football. Talking about whatever – relegation battles, title clashes, promotion run-ins, and championships – usually begins after now. That’s where we feel we are. We’re four points off the play-offs. We want to get into the play-offs. We fancy our chances. Simple as that.”
Carrick was, in general, bullish and fiery like that throughout. Self-belief was clear in an interesting section discussing Steve Gibson’s backing. There was something quite admirable in his impassioned answer in which he labelled it ‘pathetic’ that anyone in his position would need or crave such reassurance.
The fact of the matter is though, the mood on Teesside right now is one of seeking hope rather than having it. He might maintain his belief – as he must as head coach – but, in reality, little that Boro have served up of late offers any reason for optimism for us on the outside that results can come. In that sense, something has to change.
Carrick said: “There’s a natural feeling of wanting to do better and needing to do better. The boys are fully committed to it. I can see that and I can feel that, and that gives me a really good feeling for moving forward. It could be very different. We could have a different feeling around the place, but there’s huge motivation.
“How do we do it? I’ve said it plenty: We’ve got good players. We’ve got good players in a good squad and we’ve won plenty of games before, and we’ll win plenty of games again. It’s on performance and getting the best out of ourselves, whether that’s me, coaches, the players, you look at that really, and the bigger picture takes care of itself in the end. We know what we can do.”
In terms of how he might approach things, there were interesting hints on that front too. The line from the Boro boss was that ‘they would focus on what they’re good at’ which was to suggest that the recent desire to focus more on defensive balance could be scrapped. Boro’s strength is in their attack, even if it does often leave them wide open in transition.
He said: “A lot of the time it’s simple things, and we can complicate the game. We can make it harder by looking to find deeper reasons for the results. It’s about working hard, it’s dedicating, it’s believing and working for each other.
“I think you can overchange, you can overchase, you can become desperate. That’s not a good place to be coming from. I think there’s a real keenness to do well and to win, but you can be desperate to win and can end up making bad decisions and doing things that you shouldn’t really be doing. So there’s a right balance there for us.”
He continued: “Small tweaks and changes happen every week. There’s always something where you look and you might have to change certain things. We try to adapt and play in slightly different ways. That’s nothing really new. We’re always searching for that kind of optimum performance. So that doesn’t change. We just double down on what we’re good at.
“I understand why you ask the question, because we need the next result. But by going for the next result doesn’t necessarily mean big, drastic change. I think, and I’ve just said it before, we’re good at certain things. We need to be focusing on that and doubling down on what we’re really good at.
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