Southgate defends Yak exit
07 Sep 2007 - 13:39:28
Middlesbrough boss Gareth Southgate remains happy with his decision to sell Yakubu to Everton last month.
The Nigeria international was linked with a Riverside exit for much of the summer, but Southgate insists it was the striker's poor display in the August defeat at Wigan Athletic that finally persuaded him to offload the 24-year-old.
"The one thing you can't have at a club is player who is unsettled to the point where it affects his performances because that then affects the whole team and that's the position we'd got to with Yak," said Southgate.
"He was a smashing lad who I have no issue with at all but emotionally he was struggling and we saw that at Wigan, when unfortunately he gave a performance that was below his own standards.
"When a player is unsettled to that point it's time to get the best possible deal for the club.
"That process was ongoing before the Wigan game, then we decided not to take him to Fulham and I think the team responded because of that.
"No one player is more important than a football club. The players we had last year were fantastic for the team.
"We had to play a particular style with those two strikers (Yakubu and Mark Viduka) in our team and we played to their strengths and that got us over 25 goals between them and kept us in the division and got us a respectable finish.
"But with them moving on we're a different team."