Middlesbrough Former Players Association

John Craggs visited The Riverside for the cup game against Shrewsbury.John was signed from Newcastle for £60,000 in 1971 and in the 11 years he spent at the club he made 488 appearances scoring 14 goals from full back.

John is 4th in the all time appearance list behind Tim Williamson,Gordon Jones and John Hickton. He began his career at Newcasle and made his debut in 1966 at the age of 18. He went on to play 52 games for Newcastle before joining Middlesbrough because of the lack of first team appearances.

He rejoined Newcastle in 1982 but only played 12 games before finishing his playing career at Darlington where he made 54 appearances

John was a hard talking overlapping full back who was perhaps unlucky not to have been capped at senior level for England.

When interviewed he was amazed at the ammounts of money todays footballers earned but said he loved every minute of his playing career. He said that if he played today he would have to modify his game as some of his tackles alouugh fair would not be allowed today.He was dismayed that the modern game seemed to want to take tackling out of the game." There is nothing wrong with a good tackle providing you don't go in to harm the player. Players are booked now for the slightest thing. Sometimes an oposing player may be too fast for you and you miss time the talckle but providing you don't keep on miss timing it theen there is nothing wrong and a talking to should do. If you get booked in the first 10 minutes then you daren't make another tackle. Surely that can't be right or even good for football."

John also was concerned at the number of players diving in todays game either to get a free kick,penalty or get an oponnent sent off. " It didn't happen in my day. You could go eye ball to eye ball with someone then shake hands and walk away. Now you have players falling down pretending they have been head butted. Where is the black eye or broken nose," he asks.

John was warmly welcomed by the crowd in the Fenton Suite.

Rolando Ugolini who played 320 games in goal for Middlesbrough from 1948 to 1956 visited The Riverside for the match against Brighton. Roland as he is known is now a lively 87 year old who still plays a round of golf in Edinburgh where he lives with his wife Irene.

Roland is one of the oldest former players and he visits Middlesbrough once a year as guest of tha former players.

He made his debut in a 1-0 defeat away to Chelsea in 1948 and went on to be a favourite with the Middlesbrough crowd.

While at the Riverside he was prenented by Alan Peacock with a colour drawing of himself in action and also a "Christmas cheque" from Middlesbrough Former Players Association. The drawing was done by Richard Piers Rayner and was given to M.F.P.A.

Alan Peacock remembers Roland as a prankster while he was at Ayresome Park continually playing tricks on the younger members of the team.

Roland remembered the time when he was in goal against Newcastle on Boxing Day in 1949 when they won 1-0 in front of a crowd of 53,802 which still stands as a record at Ayresome Park. He also played at St Jame's Park in front of 63,381 when Middlesbrough lost 1-0.

In 1952 Middlesbrough played Tottenham at White Heart Lane on Christmas Day and lost 7-1. On another Christmas day they drew 1-1 against Leeds in 1954.

Roland kept 80 clean sheets in his time at Middlesbrough.