Who has been the Boro player who surprised you the most?

For me Bolo Zenden. I watched him at Chelsea and. I was worried we had signed a very expensive duffer who would hold back local talent like James Morrison and Downing.

How wrong I was. He was swashbuckling and for me was the glue of that team for a couple of seasons.
Also I would add Marco Branca. He was deadly and if he was deemed fit enough to play in the premier league we would have had a player on our hands.
 
I'd have thought everybody knew how good branca was... I was only about 14 when we signed him but he'd always looked quality on c4 italian football. I couldn't believe we got him.

Ince and Zenden are great shouts and echo what I thought at the time. Thought ince was past it but he ran the show for a few years, one of the best midfielders I've seen play for us. Zenden I thought was a slow winger not cut out for the prem - to a certain extent that was correct but when he moved into the middle, he was absolutely unreal. Such a transformation.

Gaston for me, thought it was a ridiculous risk we took bringing him in and thought he'd be poor and just get bullied in the championship. How wrong I was for that half a season up there with the best I've seen for us. Then the following season well... we all know how that went.
 
Definitely Merson. I know he left under a cloud and also only played 1 season in the champo.

That said 'what a season' 👍. I have never enjoyed watching a Boro player tear up a league with such ease. I swear he was in the Sun team of the weekend every week getting 9/10. I know it was the champo but he made the game look easy.

I didn't realise how good he was. To think we didn't have him in his prime either. I'm sure he got an England call up whist in the championship with us?

I guess Southgate was another. I always thought he was 'decent enough' at villa but didn't realise how good until I watched him in the flesh.
 
I'm going with a player who never played for us for long and rarely gets a mention by Boro fans. Benito Carbone, I though he was superb when we had him on loan, way better than I expected.

Stole my thunder, I don't know why but Carbone immediately sprung to mind.

I expected very little when we brought him in on loan as he was getting on a bit, but he was absolutely class.

He was so much better than I expected, I remember beating Man Utd 1-0 at Old Trafford and they couldn't get the ball off him.
 
Definitely Merson. I know he left under a cloud and also only played 1 season in the champo.

That said 'what a season' 👍. I have never enjoyed watching a Boro player tear up a league with such ease. I swear he was in the Sun team of the weekend every week getting 9/10. I know it was the champo but he made the game look easy.

I didn't realise how good he was. To think we didn't have him in his prime either. I'm sure he got an England call up whist in the championship with us?

I guess Southgate was another. I always thought he was 'decent enough' at villa but didn't realise how good until I watched him in the flesh.

Merson made the world cup squad that year.

Southgate absolutely. He would have walked into most teams back line. He certainly should've played for a bigger club and won more. Still 50 England caps despite not playing for a fashionable team.

I think all the villa buys (Ugo and Boateng too) were a lot better than I expected. I knew they were good players, I just didn't know how good.
 
What I mean about Parlour is I really didn't expect him to be so tough, so good at tackling. He could tackle with his whole body, with such force. Opposition players used to bounce off him. I thought we were signing a wide player, a winger, who could dribble and pick a pass and a cross but we actually signed a really good, physical midfield player with an edge about him.

Yeah definitely agree the type of player he was was a bit of a surprise. I just don't remember him being quite as good as you do. It was 15 years ago though.
 
When we signed Jordan Rhodes I thought he would be far more clinical than he actually turned out to be - I was buzzing when he signed.

His positional sense for getting opportunities was great and he worked hard enough, but it felt like he missed loads of sitters.
 
Surprisingly good-Boateng -thought he was a 1 dimensional dirty midfielder with villa and was pleasantly surprised with his Boro performances

Bad-Chris Boyd -was so confident in him I had a double of Boro getting promoted and him being top scorer-£50 on each☹️
 
Grant Leadbitter for me, I wrote him off when he came but he was an absolute giant of a player for us, just a shame he was injured a lot when we were in the PL.
 
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