Michael Carrick will hope to avoid the fate of Mowbray's Middlesbrough after strong end to season

The fantastic finale to the campaign must be used as a springboard to take Middlesbrough forward next season. One defeat in the last dozen games suggests a coming together of the team, despite all the setbacks endured during the campaign.

So keeping the squad as entire as possible must be seen as a vital contributory factor towards Boro hitting the ground running in 2024-25. Only once in the last 30 years have Boro completed a season so well, losing just one game out of the final 12. This was in Tony Mowbray’s first season in charge when he took over a team which had been struggling under Gordon Strachan.

Eventually, Mogga managed to get the team into gear. Mowbray arrived in the October and inherited a dressing room which had not perfectly knitted together. Strachan’s huge contingent of signings failed to blend with the remainder of Gareth Southgate’s squad and lacked the necessary togetherness.

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In many respects, Mogga’s excellent achievement that season matched that of Michael Carrick, who also inherited a squad which had lost its way when he took over the reins in October 2022. The two managers worked along the same path, quickly gaining the respect and support of the players. They brought the best out of them and the team benefitted as a result.

Carrick stamped his own playing style on the team and made a few cosmetic changes, including moving Chuba Akpom to No.10 and Marcus Forss to the right flank. It worked wonders from the start for Carrick, though Mowbray’s impact was more of a slow burner.

His team struggled for consistency following his arrival but finished like a train. Mowbray encountered early problems when he was forced to sell some of the team’s star players in the January. David Wheater, a homegrown lad who had developed into a defensive king-pin, was transferred to Premier League Bolton Wanderers, while busy midfielder Gary O’Neil also moved into the top-flight with West Ham.

Both fees were undisclosed though Wheater’s fee is likely to have been well into seven figures. He went on to play more than 200 league games for Bolton, which indicates the immense contribution he could have made for Boro over the ensuing years had they been in a position to hold on to him.

Unfortunately, both sales were enforced because Boro were cash strapped at the time. Mowbray had a good idea of the financial situation when he took over but felt immense pride at the prospect of taking up the reins at his home club.

Later in the season Mowbray also arranged for two of Strachan’s signings, Kris Boyd and Lee Miller, to go out on loan. Mogga was able to bring in a couple of players, signing the Moroccan attacking midfielder Merouane Zemmama from Hibernian for a fee of around £200,000.

The Boro boss knew Zemmama well from the time he was in charge of Hibs. He was known to be temperamental at times, and was not always consistent for Boro, but did produce some scintillating performances at times.

Mowbray also brought in Maximillian Haas, a 6ft 3in centre-back who had been playing for Bayern Munich second team for a few years without managing to make the first team. Boro paid a very small fee for Haas, which was just as well because he was able to make just two appearances and was released at the end of the season.

There were another two incoming players, both on loan deals later in the season. Mowbray brought back defender Andrew Davies from Stoke City and goalkeeper Paul Smith from Nottingham Forest. Smith was needed because of an injury to regular keeper Jason Steele and went on to play with aplomb in ten of the final 12 games.

His Boro debut, against Derby County in March, resulted in a 2-1 win which sparked the terrific finale. The season ended with four consecutive wins in which Boro scored 12 goals and conceded just three. The most impressive of these victories, and arguably the best of the whole season, came in the penultimate match.

Boro took promotion-chasing Cardiff City apart in South Wales, winning 3-0 with goals from goals from Leroy Lita, Barry Robson and Richie Smallwood. Just like the current situation, hopes were extremely high that Boro might use the new foundations to launch a promotion assault the following season, which would be their third consecutive campaign in the Championship.

One of the key factors for Mowbray was holding on to those players who he felt were vital to the cause, even though he knew he had to make massive cuts to the wage bill. A lot of players were released or went out on loan, though one player Mogga was disappointed to lose was left-back Andrew Taylor, who moved to Cardiff under freedom of contract.

Lita, who might have made a vital contribution as a goalscorer, also switched to Wales when he was sold to Swansea for £1.75m. As far as incoming players were concerned, Mowbray added a few to the squad though all of them were either free transfers or loan signings.

The best of them was undoubtedly the Belgian Faris Haroun, who made an impact in midfield, while others such as striker Bart Ogbeche and attacking midfielder Malaury Martin also played a part. There was still a feeling away from the club that Boro had not sufficiently strengthened, especially as the fans had promotion in mind.

Even so, the squad knitted well and Boro carried on where they had left off at the end of the previous campaign. Boro were unbeaten in their first 11 games in 2011-12, setting the pace in the Championship, and were in top spot at the end of the year. Unfortunately, it all started to go wrong for Mowbray and his players in the New Year. They lost their opening three games in January and were held to draws in the following two games.

The previous consistency had gone and as cracks appeared, the team gradually slid outside the promotion battle. Boro eventually finished seventh, which was a huge disappointment for the fans, who had held high hopes of a Premier League return.

In the event, Mowbray still did a relatively good job with an average squad of players at a time when Boro were struggling to generate cash in the second level. If there is a lesson to be learned it is that as much investment which is possible is needed in the squad to ensure that there are no backward steps.

Carrick is fortunate to have a decent squad going into 2024-25 in the knowledge that new additions are planned. We must assume that nobody is officially for sale, though Boro will wait probably with some trepidation to see if any major bids are received for their players, especially the likes of Emmanuel Latte Lath, Hayden Hackney and Rav van den Berg.

If Boro are to be promotion contenders next season, arguably they need all three of these players regularly in their line-up. Maybe the biggest test of all will come if Boro find their hands virtually tied behind their backs and are forced to sell one or two of these men.

The supporters will expect the incoming cash to be re-invested in the team, hopefully to ensure it is not weakened by the loss of any of their influential men. With such strong foundations having been built as a result of the bright run-in and the obvious strong togetherness in and out of the dressing room, it’s vital that Carrick has the means to take the club forward next season. And this time hopefully the improvements will be maintained all the way through the season.