Middlesbrough 1-1 Blackburn: 10-man Boro grab a draw at home
Middlesbrough came from a goal down to get a draw against Blackburn Rovers after going a man down early on at Teesside. Mohamed Besic was sent off in the 21st minute for hauling down dangerman Bradley Dack.
That was followed by a superb free-kick from Charlie Mulgrew curling past Darren Randolph to give the away side a lead in the 22nd minute.
Around the hour mark, Jordan Hugill was denied by Mulgrew’s well-timed tackle but he laid off to Assombalonga who bent in a glorious shot to equalise proceedings. Despite the end result, the Rovers were the better team, chiefly because Boro had only 10 men on the pitch.
After equalising, the home side did go in search of a winner but couldn’t go past David Raya. It took some spirited defending from the away team to keep Boro quiet despite numerical superiority.
Dack should have scored for Blackburn but he hit the crossbar, while Raya had to make a few good saves to deny Tony Mowbray’s men.
This result puts Boro at sixth place in the table, two points ahead of seventh-placed Nottingham Forest. Most importantly, they are seven and six points behind Norwich City and Leeds United respectively, who take the first and second spot in the table respectively.
Meanwhile, the Rovers are in the mid-table scrap at the moment with 30 points, six behind the playoff spots.
Here’s how the Middlesbrough fans reacted after this spirited effort by their team to come back from a goal down despite being a man down. Safe to say that a few were not happy with what Besic did:
Can’t fault any of them on that field at the end. Fantastic spirit to salvage anything after Besic tried to single handedly lose us the game
— … (@OneSmallPersonn) December 8, 2018
Brilliant from Britt, Much better when we had him and Hugill up top. Wtf Besic was doing I don’t know 🤷♂️
— Tom (@mfctom97) December 8, 2018
Can’t be disappointed with that second half performance, Saville and wing quality for me
— Ross (@Rossss77) December 8, 2018
Great result under the circumstances, Where are the Britt haters now 😉
— UTB (@mfcfanpages) December 8, 2018
could have been well beaten by then as well. Good strike though
— ##Duggie## (@Duggmeister) December 8, 2018
Will take that with 10 men and a goal down
— 🇦🇹 (@ftblRbz) December 8, 2018