Gareth Southgate, master of the art of penalty kicks himself, has announced that Stewart Downing will remain as Boro’s spot-kick taker, despite two awful misses so far this season.
Downing missed kicks at home to Stoke and on Saturday at Sunderland – failing to hit the target with both. However, he’s up for taking the next kick and an empathetic Southgate is fine with that…
“Stewart’s already said he wants to take our next penalty,” said Southgate.
“I don’t have a problem with that because we have faith in him”.
The news will obviously change Downing’s long-term scoring potential in fantasy terms. Many have already lost faith in the Boro winger but 7% of managers in the Fantasy Premier League have retained Downing in their squads and with a home game with West Brom this weekend, it would be just like fantasy football for Downing to fetch some decent points.