Middlesbrough told why notorious £12m flop 'sank' at the Riverside - It involves Gareth Southgate | OneFootball

FLW's Middlesbrough fan pundit has given his verdict on why Afonso Alves didn't work out at the club.

This article is part of Football League World's 'Terrace Talk' series, which provides personal opinions from our FLW Fan Pundits regarding the latest breaking news, teams, players, managers, potential signings and more…

Middlesbrough broke their club-record transfer fee to sign Afonso Alves in the 2008 January transfer market.

It was reported that the Teesside outfit spent £12 million to sign the Brazilian from Dutch side Heerenveen.

The forward struggled after joining Gareth Southgate’s side, however, as he featured a total of 42 times in the Premier League before departing after just 18 months at the club.

He contributed six goals from 11 games in his first half-season, but a difficult 2008/09 saw him score only four more times as Boro suffered relegation to the Championship.

This led to his departure, with Alves making the move to Qatari outfit Al-Sadd in 2009, spending the rest of his career in the Middle East.

When asked where Alves’ signing ranks among the worst in club history, Football League World's Middlesbrough fan pundit, Liam Day, claimed that it’s in the mix for being top of the pile.

He believes the forward didn’t live up to the big expectations surrounding his arrival, citing injury issues, as well as adaptability problems as two major factors in his underwhelming form.

“He’d definitely be up there, really, wouldn’t he?” Liam told Football League World.

“He came in with such big expectations after scoring so many goals in the Netherlands, and he just really failed to deliver, only getting 10 league goals.

“It does seem like adaptability was one of his big issues. Coming across to England and the Premier League, it’s never easy, and players can either sink or swim.

“And obviously, he sank for us. He was unfortunate, could never find any consistent game time.”

Day also questioned whether Alves was a good fit for a Southgate team, and if someone more attacking was needed as manager to get the best out of him.

“It might also be that he didn’t fit the system with Gareth Southgate. We know he’s quite a defensive manager, maybe we needed to be playing a bit more on the front foot to be getting him involved more?

“But, yes, there were many reasons, and it’d definitely be up there with the price we paid, especially at the time it was a lot of money, so he’s definitely up there for one of the worst signings.”

Middlesbrough were unable to come straight back up the following year without Alves, and didn’t make their return to the Premier League until 2016 under Aitor Karanka.

Boro spent just one year in the top flight before going back down, and are still awaiting their promotion to the division again.

Southgate struggled with setting up the Middlesbrough attack in general during the 2008/09 campaign, with the team scoring only 28 times in 38 games, which led to their 19th place finish.

But, it's clear that his initial strong start of six goals in 11 games during the second half of the 2007/08 campaign that Alves was a striker who certainly had the ability to score goals at Premier League level on Teesside.

Three of those goals came on the final day of that season too, when he scored a hat-trick at the Riverside in Boro's memorable 8-1 thrashing of Manchester City.

Indeed, he was a Brazil international, and was even nominated for the European Golden Boot award thanks to his exploits in the Eredivisie prior to his Boro move, in which he finished second in the voting behind none other than Roma icon Francesco Totti.

However, with the likes of Yakubu, Massimo Maccarone and Mark Viduka now no longer spearheading Boro's attack, Alves was brought in by Southgate to follow in their sizeable footsteps at the Riverside, and that was always going to be a tough ask for any player.

With not much help arriving in the goals department from the likes of Mido, Marvin Emnes or Jeremie Aliadiere respectively, it was largely left up to Alves to fire Boro to Premier League safety.

But a season of just four league goals in 31 appearances told the story of a striker who was desperately short of confidence, with him often snatching at chances as he tried to turn his goalscoring tide.

Alves’ record in the Eredivisie really was quite impressive prior to his arrival at Middlesbrough, so it looked like a move with a lot of potential.

He scored 45 times in 39 appearances in the Dutch league, which was reason enough to be excited about his arrival in January 2008.

But the move to the Premier League proved trickier than anticipated, and it was one move that fans can point to as the beginning of the end for the club’s time in the top flight.

It goes to show that even the best signings on paper can go completely wrong, and that spending big isn’t a guarantee of success in football.