Middlesbrough need to be wary of QPR player they should know all about | OneFootball

Rumaran Burrell is thriving for QPR this season, and Middlesbrough must be wary of their returning ex-forward

Rumarn Burrell spent three years contracted to Middlesbrough between 2019 and 2022, but failed to register a single league appearance for the club during that time, and he will be returning to The Riverside this weekend with Queens Park Rangers a completely different player to the one who left them.

Things couldn't be going much better at Middlesbrough right now.

Despite being on their second head coach of the season, through no real fault of their own, Boro sit in 2nd after 20 games into the Championship season, sitting just five points off of table-toppers Coventry City, having halved the gap from ten points less than a week ago.

Now under the guidance of Swedish head coach Kim Hellberg, with former head coach Rob Edwards having been poached by Premier League outfit Wolverhampton Wanderers last month, the Swede has won each of his first three games in charge.

Derby County, Hull City, and Charlton Athletic have all been defeated by Hellberg so far, with his next opponents, QPR, presenting an opportunity to make it four wins from four this weekend as they host them at The Riverside on Saturday.

QPR themselves are having a strong campaign in their own right, sitting in 7th place, level on points with Hull, who sit just above them, with a win on Saturday potentially propelling them back into the play-off positions.

Middlesbrough will be confident of the test that stands in front of them, but will have to be wary of one R's player in particular, who will have an extra incentive to make an impact in this fixture.

Burrell spent time in the youth academies of both Coventry City and Scunthorpe United, but it would be with Grimsby Town in April 2019 where he would make his senior debut, before moving to Middlesbrough at the end of that season.

In three years on Teesside, the forward made just one senior appearance for the club, playing just a singular minute in an FA Cup tie away to Brentford, and subsequently would head out on loan with both Bradford City and Falkirk, before a permanent move to the latter in 2022 followed.

He'd spend just one season with Falkirk before switching to Cove Rangers in 2023, scoring 21 goals and grabbing seven assists in 34 games in the Scottish League One, attracting the interest of Burton Albion and switching to the Pirelli Stadium at the end of the season.

Burrell made 30 appearances for Burton in his solitary season in League One, scoring 11 times and grabbing two assists, earning a move to QPR this summer, where, under former Rennes and Strasbourg head coach Julien Stephan, he has found a new level to his game.

The Jamaican international has featured in all 20 of QPR's Championship games so far this season, scoring nine and assisting once, often keeping the highly-rated Richard Kone out of the side due to his effectiveness up top, with Boro needing to pay extra close attention to their former outcast striker.

Kim Hellberg must be extra wary of Rumarn Burrell as Middlesbrough face QPR this weekend

Burrell will feel an extra incentive to go and make an impact on Saturday and show the club where he spent three years at exactly what they could have had.

Indeed, Boro's attacking options are not lacklustre in the slightest, with Morgan Whittaker, Tommy Conway, David Strelec, and Delano Burgzorg all providing Hellberg strong competition in the final third.

However, they have yet to keep a clean sheet under Hellberg, and if they are to give themselves the best opportunity of a fourth consecutive victory at the weekend over QPR, they must pay close attention to Burrell.

Many Boro fans will not remember much about Burrell, with the 24-year-old having made little to no impact during his time with the club, but he will certainly remember them, and will not need much more motivation to go and prove to his former employers that they made a mistake in letting him go.