Just the Job for now as Boro strike lucky with the third man

There is indeed "One Job on Teesside", as the regulars at the Riverside are wont to sing. The trouble for Joseph-Desiré Job is that there are only two openings for strikers in Steve McClaren's first-team formation, and the tall, lean Cameroonian happens to be the Middlesbrough manager's third-choice candidate for them.

There is indeed "One Job on Teesside", as the regulars at the Riverside are wont to sing. The trouble for Joseph-Desiré Job is that there are only two openings for strikers in Steve McClaren's first-team formation, and the tall, lean Cameroonian happens to be the Middlesbrough manager's third-choice candidate for them.

The frustration of being among the ranks of the unemployed, while Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink and Mark Viduka were given the oppor-tunity to strike up a profitable working partnership, had Job considering a new start elsewhere as autumn gave way to winter in the north-east of England. He may yet push to take his skills elsewhere at the end of the season but, for the time being at least, there is only one player fulfilling the job description of goalscorer at Middlesbrough and that is the 27-year-old African.

Hasselbaink has not scored for six matches. Viduka has not scored since the first week in December, and has missed the past four games because of a hamstring injury. Viduka will be absent again today when Everton visit the Riverside for a vital contest between the unfancied contenders for Champions' League qualification. He is likely to be out until February.

That is good news, from a personal, professional point of view, for Job. Ten of his 15 Premiership appearances this season have been as a substitute, but in Middlesbrough's last seven League and cup matches he has scored five times.

"It's going well for me at the moment," Job acknowledged, "but that is because I am playing. When I don't play, I can't be happy, and I feel frustrated. My goalscoring record is good, and I'm very proud of it, but I don't want it to stop there. I want to keep it going and show that I can be consistent in a whole season, not just for four or five games. With Mark Viduka's injury, maybe I will get more chances to play, but we'll see what happens. If there's competition between the strikers, that's not a problem for me, but if I'd known it was going to be like this, maybe I would have made another choice last summer."

Job signed a new contract at the end of last season, having re-established himself at the Riverside after spending the second half of the 2001-02 season on loan to Metz. He scored the opening goal in the Carling Cup final at Cardiff in February and won the penalty that Boudewijn Zenden converted in Middlesbrough's 2-1 win against Bolton, the Teesside club's first major trophy success.

"I thought I would play more than I have done," Job added. "I signed the new deal before Jimmy and Mark came. The manager said we needed some new strikers, and I thought it would be better for the club. I thought, 'I'll go for the fight, because there'll be competition'. If I play well and then I am taken out of the team, then obviously I will have to think about my situation. As long as I play well and I'm involved in the team because I deserve to be, then there's no problem. But when I feel I play well and then I'm not involved, it's not fair."

It was, ironically, a season spent largely on the bench that prompted Job to leave Lens and join Middlesbrough in the summer of 2000, for £3m. Since then, through a roller-coaster run of form, he has seen off a host of rivals: Alen Boksic, Hamilton Ricard, Brian Deane, Noel Whelan, Andy Campbell, Dean Windass and Massimo Maccarone. His long-term task now is to break up McClaren's preferred combination of Hasselbaink and Viduka.

"I've hardly played with Mark Viduka," Job said. "I've played with Hasselbaink recently, and Szilard Nemeth. We are all good strikers here. There's Malcolm Christie as well; he has just come back from injury. I don't think there's any special partnership, as long as we score goals.

"I don't think about joining other clubs now. I only think about the way I play for Middlesbrough. The team and the club have improved dramatically compared with four or five years ago." They have indeed, with the Carling Cup and the FA Youth Cup on display in the trophy cabinet, a place in the last 32 of the Uefa Cup, and qualification for next season's Champions' League an achievable target.

"We can still have a chance of a place in the top four," Job said. "But the pressure is on us to beat Everton. They are eight points ahead of us and if we lose it will be 11, which is a lot to make up. Everton have been solid, and they have a great chance of finishing fourth. But I'm not an Everton player. I'm a Middles-brough player, and we want to take that place."