Jordan Hugill scored just seven goals for Boro under Tony Pulis but now he is in the form of his life at Championship rivals Queens Park Rangers.
You can never underestimate the impact a change of scenery can have on the fortunes of an out-of-form centre-forward.
Jordan Hugill found the net just seven times in 42 games at Middlesbrough last season, with Tony Pulis’s dogged, defensive tactics hardly helping to lay on the chances for striker who was desperate to make an impression on loan at his boyhood club.
But since moving to Queens Park Rangers in the summer, Hugill is starting to look once again like the powerhouse of a number nine who had defenders quaking in their boots during a prolific spell at Preston North End.
The 27-year-old took his tally to five in just six games for QPR with a brace in Saturday’s impressive 2-1 win away at Sheffield Wednesday. Even a barely believable, one-yard miss against Wigan Athletic has been buried underneath a glut of goals.
Clearly, Mark Warburton’s free-flowing style has given Hugill a new lease of life after 12 miserable months under the plodding pragmatism of Pulis at the Riverside.
“The boss feels I should be a 20-goal-a-season striker and who’s to say I can’t be?,” Hugill told the Gazette recently.
Why not indeed? If Hugill does indeed break the 20-goal barrier, Pulis’s popularity could hit a new low in Middlesbrough.
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