GARETH Southgate has been given a vote of confidence by the Middlesbrough board.

At some clubs that often heralds the manager’s imminent demise but Boro’s chief executive Keith Lamb is adamant that, despite a run of ten league games without a win, Southgate ‘will get the time to put it right.’ He said: “We still remain confident, myself and Steve Gibson, that Gareth is the man to do it. He’s coping with the pressure very well.

“The harder it gets the more determined he is to succeed.

That was Gareth as a player.

He came into the game late and then played 57 times for England.

“We saw him a number of times when he was the captain of Middlesbrough when he roused the dressing room and kept the players together.

He is a fighter and a winner and that is just what we need at the moment.”

And defender Chris Riggott has denied rumours of unrest in the dressing room, claiming Southgate continues to command the 100 per cent support of his Boro players.

“We all want to fight for him and we don’t want anything to be going on (a change in manager) so we battled well out on the pitch to prove that everyone’s behind the manager,”

said Riggott.

The Boro centre-back believes the fighting qualities on show in the FA Cup fourth round victory at Wolves was the team’s own vote of confidence for the under-fire manager.

And with Mido’s brooding presence removed from the camp for the rest of the season, Riggott was happy to dismiss any suggestions Southgate had ‘lost the dressing room’.

“I think the Wolves win has proved that we are 100 per cent behind the gaffer,” said Riggott.

“There have not been any problems in the dressing room. Things go on at football clubs all the time and in the January transfer window sometimes it escalates these sorts of problems.

“But there are no real problems as such, it’s just normal goings on at a football club – people coming and going. As far as the dressing room is going we’re 100 per cent together.

“To be honest I’ve not really noticed any change in the gaffer. Obviously it’s a pressure game and it’s tough not winning matches so anybody would find it hard. But we responded well and that’s a good reflection on the manager.”

Riggott was the 28-year-old veteran of Middlesbrough’s youthful back four at Molineux and Lamb has confirmed the club will continue to place their faith in young talent.

“Earlier in the season we didn’t get the points that perhaps our performances deserved,’’ admitted the club’s chief executive. “But Gareth made a lot of changes in the summer and brought a lot of young players in to bring down the average age of the team considerably.

“It was always his intention to try to put together a highenergy team and it should take time to bed in but we remain confident that it is the right way to go and the one thing that is certain is that Gareth will get the time to put it right.

“We are not panicking.

Gareth and his staff are just working hard on the training field and we are hoping that the harder you work the better the results you will get.’’