Newcastle Utd v Middlesbrough:WEAK AT both ends and stodgy in the middle, Newcastle United and Middlesbrough have lacked decent spines this season, not to mention strikers as incisive as Alan Shearer and centre-halves as assured as Gareth Southgate.
That pair may one day develop into top managers but right now their respective sides could do with the former England team-mates turning back time and stepping on to the pitch rather than occupying adjacent technical areas at St James' Park tonight.
One of their mutual problems is a suspicion that both the Newcastle manager and his Middlesbrough counterpart are more worried by the growing spectre of relegation than many of their players.
This perception is the more pronounced on Tyneside and was only heightened by Fabricio Coloccini last week. "The manager feels the pain, perhaps even more than us," admitted Newcastle's Argentine defender. "It is understandable because he has been here for so long, he was brought up in Newcastle and has always been a fan."
Suddenly realising the potential subtext of what he had just said, Coloccini hastily added: "But that does not mean we do not care."
Plain speaking is one of Shearer's strengths and he has advised his underachieving players not "to take the piss" out of their club or its supporters.
"The manager wants us to be feeling what the fans are feeling," explained Coloccini. "He wants us to share his passion and know how important these games are and what relegation would mean to the city. We understand the message. We must win against Middlesbrough, it is that simple."
While Shearer's short Tyneside tenure has been dominated by a disciplinary crackdown, Southgate's young Boro side have suffered from a submissive streak on the pitch. Their manager, though, is irked by suggestions that they lack physical aggression.
"It annoys me when people talk about our shortage of fight," Southgate said. "When I was younger I thought it was important to win fights in football but now I realise it takes more courage to accept the ball, keep it under pressure and create something."
Even so he will miss his feistiest stopper, the injured Emanuel Pogatetz, tonight when Boro fans trust the improvisational Tuncay Sanli can expose Newcastle's defensive fallibility.
If, given their huge debt and their squad's extreme youth, Boro's position appears understandable, Newcastle - whose wage bill is twice that of the Teessiders - should never be in this mess. That partly explains why Shearer has dubbed tonight as "the biggest ever" game of his career, eclipsing anything he experienced at Euro 96, France 98 or with Blackburn Rovers.
Accordingly, devising the correct tactics and team selection are imperative. While Michael Owen is likely to be restored to the starting XI he may not necessarily be deployed in the "hole" role behind Mark Viduka and Obafemi Martins which Kevin Keegan believed represented his future.
Shearer, who maintains Owen remains an out-and-out striker, is also worried that a three-man attack deprives his side of vital width. "What you lack with three strikers up front is a little bit of width. That's the balance I've got to get right," he said.
Shearer might compromise by playing Owen off Viduka in attack while asking Martins to reinvent himself as a right-winger - a sort of Stuart Ripley with shooting boots. Yet the key to a game which, if lost, will surely spell relegation could be Boro's outstanding individual Stewart Downing.
The left-winger's likely battle with Newcastle's star defender, Habib Beye, promises to form a key sub-plot. "Stewart can keep us up," said Southgate after refusing to sell his prize asset to Tottenham in January. Tonight could determine whether Boro's manager was right.
Guardian Service
