When Alvaro Negredo looks back at his decision to return to Spain after just one season at Manchester City, it's one he admits was a mistake. ‘The Beast’ was involved in 31 goals in 49 appearances in all competitions during the 2013/14 season before sealing a move to Valencia. The following two years have been a nightmare for Negredo, but now he is back in England and looking to kickstart his career before it is too late.
Negredo has just turned 31 and cannot afford another wasted year. He has joined Middlesbrough on an initial season-long loan deal and must fire them to safety to have any chance of making the switch permanent. Boro won’t be able to afford his reported £100,000-a-week wages in the Championship, nor will the former Spain international want to drop down to England’s second tier. A return to Valencia is also likely to rank low on his wish list next summer.
The former Spain international is one of eight new faces on Riverside this summer, but his arrival is easily the most eye-catching. In two matches the Spaniard has played a direct hand in all three of Middlesbrough’s league goals - the same contribution he managed in his last 13 appearances for Valencia. Just as he started life at City, he scored for Boro with his first attempt on target.
If there is to be any further symmetry between the two campaigns then Boro fans will be happy to know that Negredo went on to score eight goals and register three assists by the time 2014 started. He was a wrecking ball during that period. His physicality and powerful runs proved too much for most. He could score all manner of goals: left foot, right foot, headers, free kicks, with his back to goal and one-on-ones. The unpredictability made him unplayable at times.
However, after scoring City’s winner against Liverpool on Boxing Day in 2013 Negredo would only score one more league goal for City before returning to Spain. He only managed 10 league goals in two seasons with Valencia. His confidence was gone. Of players that scored at least five goals in Europe’s big five leagues last season only the likes of prolific goalscorers Robert Lewandowski, Neymar, Kevin Gameiro and Luis Suarez missed clear-cut chances more frequently than Negredo (1 every 114.8 minutes).
Negredo would have been forgiven had he weighed in with a similar amount of goals as the aforementioned frontmen, but that couldn’t have been further from the truth. The sight of a once revered striker missing chances he would have previously finished with his eyes closed became a hallmark of Gary Neville’s failed tenure at Valencia last season, with the striker only managing to convert a clear-cut chance every 304 minutes under the Englishman.
Middlesbrough's decision to put survival in the hands of a striker that has seemingly lost his way in recent years is still a gamble. However, Aitor Karanka’s side believe it is a calculated one worth taking with the reward of staying up far outweighing the cost of keeping Negredo at the club for a minimum of 12 months.
Concentrating on only the present and not his future, Negredo has made the ideal start to life back in the Premier League. Only Zlatan Ibrahimovic and his former City striker partner Sergio Aguero have played a direct hand in as many goals as Negredo in the opening two matches (3). The understanding he showed with teammates Adam Forshaw and Cristhian Stuani in the build up to Boro's second goal against Sunderland, which proved the match winner, would have been very encouraging for Karanka. Negredo created both of Stuani's goals at the weekend and that combination is currently the most prolific in the Premier League.
The minimum requirement of Negredo must be to reach double figures in a league campaign for the first time since his final season at Sevilla (25 goals). Boro's primary goal is to consolidate their position in the Premier League and Karanka will know that if Negredo can reach double figures then his side have a very good chance of staying up.
In fact, 23 of the last 33 teams that have been relegated from the Premier League have gone down without a single player managing 10 or more goals. There are exceptions and other factors to consider, but having a regular goalscorer in your ranks only increases your chances of survival, as Jermain Defoe proved for Sunderland last season.
In recent memory Newcastle and Queens Park Rangers were both relegated despite having a player score 11 - Georginio Wijnaldum - and 18 league goals - Charlie Austin - respectively. However, neither of those teams had any sort of cohesion. They were poorly run football clubs full of bad eggs from top to bottom. That wouldn't happen under Steve Gibson's watch.
Up until Negredo made the £20.6m move to City in 2013 he tended to start the season slowly. In the first half of the 2010/11 campaign he only managed five goals. He would score another 15 in his next 22 appearances. The same is true of the 2011/12 campaign, where he scored five goals in the first half, but a further nine in the last half of the season. In 2012/13 he managed eight goals prior to the turn of the year before exploding into life with 17 goals in 21 appearances in the last six months of the season. Since leaving City he hasn't even got started.
Negredo has now got a clean slate; back in a league he knows he shouldn't have been too hasty in leaving. There hasn't been a lot to cheer about for football fans in the north east in recent years, but the sight of Negredo rediscovering form close to his best would be the perfect way to repay the faith shown by Boro this summer.
Is Negredo a spent force or can he keep Middlesbrough in the Premier League? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below?
