It looks as if the Albert Adomah incident at English side Middlesbrough has been confined to the back burner – much to everybody’s relief.
No doubt Adomah’s transfer request still stands on the table, though player and manager appear to have patched up their differences.
I don’t think that Adomah was at his best against Leeds United last Sunday, but wide players can have a frustrating habit of blowing hot and cold.
Albert blows hot more often than not, and one of the reasons is the hard work which Aitor Karanka has put in on the training ground to make the Ghanaian international a better all-round player.
Karanka concentrated on making Adomah more of a right sided mid-fielder than an out-and-out winger last season and the team reaped the dividends.
Despite the arrival at the Riverside of players of the calibre of Carlos De Pena and Stewart Downing, Adomah has got enough natural talent to hold down a near-regular place in the team.
He’s already scored three goals this season which indicates that he is potentially developing into a box-to-box player.
Certainly, few left-backs in the Championship this season will enjoy lining up against him.
All the more reason to ensure that Karanka keeps one arm around Adomah in the unlikely prospect that things don’t always work out perfectly well for the player.
In any case it would have been criminal if all of Karanka’s hard work on the training pitch was wasted.