Blackburn 2-1 Middlesbrough: Paul Lambert and Aitor Karanka reaction
Tuesday 1 March 2016 23:37, UK
A furious Aitor Karanka tore into his Middlesbrough players and aimed a swipe at his own supporters after they squandered the opportunity to go top of the Sky Bet Championship table with a 2-1 loss at Blackburn.
Boro would have moved ahead of leaders Burnley and Hull with a point at Ewood Park but, with Sean Dyche and Steve Bruce watching on from the stands, they froze in east Lancashire and were undone by two players they used to employ.
Academy graduate goalkeeper Jason Steele made three fine saves from ex-Blackburn striker Jordan Rhodes and, after Hope Akpan had given Rovers the lead, Danny Graham, another who spent the formative years of his career at the Riverside, doubled the advantage.
Adam Forshaw pulled one back late on but it did not improve Karanka's mood by the time he conducted his post-match press conference.
"It's taken for us 75-85 minutes to wake up," he said. "It's really difficult for me to understand why a team like Blackburn, who is in the middle of the table and which had played five games in the last two weeks, and their players wanted it more than us.
"Their players are jumping more than us, they were quicker than us, even when they were winning 2-0 they were desiring to score the third one.
"When we are playing to get promotion, or at least to be in the play-offs, it is difficult to understand."
The Spaniard then offered a sarcastic riposte to the Boro supporters who have spent large parts of the season querying why they have not deployed two out-and-out strikers.
Rhodes, signed for £9million from Rovers last month, started along with David Nugent, although the latter seemed to be deployed in a more withdrawn role.
"Today everybody will be happy in Middlesbrough because everybody wanted to play with two strikers," Karanka said. "We played today (with two). Maybe everybody's happy today even when we've lost the game.
"The main thing for me is to win the games. Today I decided to play with two because I felt it was the best thing and we are going to play more times with two. Again, if I made the people happy playing two strikers here when we've lost the game, it's good for them."
Blackburn boss Paul Lambert had declared in his pre-match press conference his club were a "stronger unit" after offloading Rhodes last month, even though the striker scored 85 times in three-and-a-half years with the team.
The Scot knows about promotion out of this division having taken Norwich to the top table in 2011 and believes Boro may be feeling the pressure down the stretch after losing the play-off final last term.
"They're a top side," he said. "What happens when you see the finishing line, to try and get out, sometimes nerves come into it. Whether that happens to them again, I don't know.
"You'd like to think they will see it through this time because of the disappointment of last year. You will tend to find between now and the end of the season it will be pretty twitchy."
