Chris Wilder has vowed to make Boro chiefs' lives a nightmare so they don’t languish in the Championship for another decade.
The Teesside chief has bids in for three players and has likened himself to a greedy “kid in a sweet shop”, as he tries to rebuild Boro into a Premier League side. Wilder has turned up the pressure on Boro to deliver better players in the “most difficult transfer market” he’s ever known.
Wilder says fans have to be realistic and he can’t “bring in Cristiano Ronaldo and Gareth Bale” - but reckons they do have “half a chance” if his squad is strengthened this summer. They have an £8m bid in for Groningen’s Jorgen Strand Larsen after selling Marcus Tavernier to Bournemouth, and Wilder is pushing hard to be given more ammo.
Wilder said: “I am sure Steve (Gibson) didn’t bring me and the coaching staff in to float around in mid-table. He understands more than anyone we need to get things done and bring in better players for us to work with, and add to the group.
“The team is well coached. It is not a team that gets chucked out. We have a good structure in and out of possession. An identity. We can mix it up a little. We can do this and that. But ultimately from being well coached, to pushing, with really good players and strength in depth, is the hardest thing.”
Wilder says everything has to “align” on Teesside adding: “The manager deals with all the personalities, and we get on the right track. Momentum. Great facilities, fans up beat, ambitious owner, and manager. So that in ten, 15 years we are not still a Championship club, and so that we see a way out of this division.”
On his pursuit of new blood, Wilder has come up with a reason why he is “overweight”! He added: “I am a bit disappointed because I am a selfish manager. I am a selfish kid in the sweet shop. I want that one and that one. That sweet, that bag of crisps, and that bottle of pop. That is possibly why I am three stone overweight! That is the way it is.
“Of course I am a little disappointed. I look at it and think should I accept it? I am quite happy I am waking up in the night and thinking we need to get that done, and pushing and pushing. I bet the people above me are thinking why have we brought this guy into the building because he is on to us all the time. I am. And I am not making any apologies about that.
“I have said to the guys: I am going to push and push. Because I don’t think I am doing my job, and that part of my character is me. I am driving everyone crazy."
