Well, this one was a fun one. Complicated by the old fashioned and more recent interpretations of positions. Plus perhaps trying to squeeze in two of who we think are Erimus74's favourites into the group of 12.
Here is his answer in his own words...
"Down to 5 players who I loved to watch, who would run through a brick wall for the mighty Boro & we struggled to replace when missing, well IMHO, anyway
Gary Hamilton, who played 260 games for the Boro scoring 27 goals, heart of a lion, who could ever forget his last minute winner v Newcastle in 83 on a Tuesday night, his shimmy when scoring the winner v Bradford in the semi final playoff 2nd leg, or his diving header v Notts County, his long range goals v Plymouth, Southampton, his tussel v Trevor Hurlock of Millwall in 88 when the Boro won 4-2 a Boro legend, I post stuff of this day on FF & he always comes back with a comment, it was a pleasure G to play for the Boro
Malcolm Allison gave him his debut away to Bolton Feb 83 & till his final game away to Sheff Weds in 89 when we were relegated he gave 110%
Unfortunately his Boro career was cut short after he played for the Boro through injuries
Deano, another very good signing, Bruce paying Aston Villa £60k for his signature, mostly wearing the No2 shirt but playing midfield stopping the opposition, who can forget during the epic FAC matches v Everton in the 4th round replay at Ayresome Park when he crunched into Peter Reid who knew he was in for a rough night
Dean Glover was only here a short while but made a big impact, playing only 50 games, between 1987 to 1989, scoring 5 goals, IMHO, we struggled to replace Deano when Bruce sold him to Port Vale for £200k after we beat Man Utd 1-0 on the 2nd January 1989, think it was the chance to make money on Deano what tempted the club & faced the consequences of relegation
Robbie Mustoe, played 365 games for the Boro between 1990 to 2002, scoring 25 goals, a great signing by Colin Todd, Boro paid Oxford £375k for his signature & what a valuable player he was who deservedly earned a testimonial
Robbie scored some cracking goals in his Boro career, made his debut with John Hendrie & John Wark & honestly don't think what a signing Colin Todd thought he was getting
The biggest compliment I can give Mustoe is when Robbo came & started spending big, buying big name players, playing at Wembley Robbie was the 1st name on the teamsheet, he was one player Robbo couldnt do without, in our 1st season back in the PL under Robbo Boro gad lost 8 on the bounce, think Robbie was missing for all of those games, on his return back away to Coventry he was instrumental in us getting a point in a 0-0 game & stopped the consecutive defeats
2 promotions, 3 Cup finals, he was a great servant for the Boro & was outstanding in an FAC SF defeat v Arsenal in April 2002
Paul Ince & George Boateng were two exceptional players who we signed, Robbo paid Liverpool £1m, Paul Ince played 93 games over 3 seasons, scoring 7 goals, Steve McClaren bought George from Villa for £5m
I loved watching both pkayers playing for the Boro, they covered every blade of the grass, their performance were top drawer, though George's shooting not so, I remember him scoring a goal at the Riverside when the ball was sky high he just waited for it to smash it home, I was expecting it to going in to orbit, goaaaalllll, he played for the Boro between 2002 - 2008 playing 182 games, scoring 7 goals, when he missed a group of games the team struggled
It boils down to two players Robbie & GH, with Robbie winning the nod for the No6 shirt"
Plus a bonus photo of Gary Hamilton from Erimus74.
So the outcome is that nobody got it right. There is a question mark against Zoophonic's answer as I think he was answering the question for the previous day.
As you can see. I have moved on to right sided holding midfield player (4). So we can use all of the discussions from yesterday to influence our decisions.
Answers in by 12:00 noon UK time tomorrow (10 April) please.
