Middlesbrough lost 3-1 at home to Bristol City in the Championship tonight.
Middlesbrough welcomed a Bristol City side who’d lost their seven previous fixtures in all competitions tonight, watched on by their newly appointed manager Nigel Pearson.
The Robins would put on quite the first-half show for their new boss – previous Middlesbrough target Famara Diedhiou scored twice and Nahki Wells scored one to give Bristol City a 3-0 lead at half-time.
Dael Fry would claw one back for Middlesbrough with 10-minutes remaining, but Boro couldn’t mount anymore of a comeback.
READ: Warnock willing to sell Middlesbrough man after contract ‘snub’
Having won their previous two games going into tonight, Middlesbrough massively let themselves down with what was another defensively weak performance at the Riverside.
One man took the brunt of Middlesbrough fans’ online criticism though, and that was goalkeeper Marcus Bettinelli.
The man brought in from Fulham ahead of this season has been a contested name at times, and plenty of Middlesbrough fans took to Twitter to berate his antics in tonight’s game:
does bettinelli ever want to come off his line??
— Will (@wildersreds) February 23, 2021
Never back bettinelli to claim a thing in his box
— Andy McCarten (@andymacca8) February 23, 2021
How slow is Bettinelli! Why does Warnock continue with him? He’s terrible
— gibgod (@gibgod) February 23, 2021
Bettinelli is stealing a wage #MIDBRC
— Kristian (@JotunGinger) February 23, 2021
Bettinelli is genuinely now worse than Brad Guzan and that is seriously impressive, get Mejias back
— Alex Hall (@boro_alex2) February 23, 2021
hahahahaha bettinelli mate what are you doing? You’ve got to be getting straight out to that https://t.co/1z0WHUsn4l
— Jack (@jackallisonnn) February 23, 2021
Bettinelli plays in slow motion
— Michael 🇸🇮 (@MikeyyyBoro) February 23, 2021