Thursday, November 03, 2005
Boro 3 Dnipro 0
Keeping the momentum going, Boro dismissed the Ukrainians in comprehensive fashion at The Riverside to go top of group D with 6 points and no goals conceded in the competition so far. Only 13000 turned out in the rain but there was noise enough to celebrate a superb opening goal by Yakubu towards the end of the first half. Things were beginning to look a little laboured, if not panic stricken before Mendieta, with evidently renewed confidence played in the striker, from which point the result looked in little doubt.The second half was all Boro - with 2 early strikes from Mark Viduka, who until his first looked below form again and was coming in for a little commentator criticism. However, his turn, set up and vicious strike was the best of the night, soon followed by a rebounded shot into the net from an initial Morrison volley. At 3-0 the home side had the luxury of being able to rest key players: Yakubu, Mendieta and soon after Viduka all came off to give Maccarone, Nemeth and youngster Jason Kennedy a chance to join the party. Unfortunately a handful of chances ended in no advance on the scoreline, but it was an easy enough win on the night with a lot of good performances to celebrate. The 3-5-2 system seems to be working very well, with Bates, Riggott and Queudrue never looking overly troubled at the back and Pogatetz and Parnaby getting forward to good effect at times. It all adds to a nice vein of form that reads one defeat in eight - and that was against West Ham, which we all know should have been a draw...
My MOTM: Of those that played 90 mins Morrison caught the eye, but Mendieta was the spark from midfield that made the game ours.
