Missing play-offs would be 'complete failure' for Boro

February is here, the snowdrops are coming up and the first faint promise of spring is in the air, but for Middlesbrough fans thoughts of a sunny May afternoon at Wembley seem a distant prospect right now.

Monday's 3-2 defeat at home to Sunderland in the Tees-Wear derby left Michael Carrick's Boro seventh in the Championship, outside the play-off places on goal difference.

It was a 90 minutes that encapsulated their season to date with early attacking verve and promise being undermined by an inability to keep the ball out of the net.

Following that defeat, the head coach told the press he wasn't concerned about Boro's form. That's not a sentiment shared by the club's supporters.

A run of four defeats in the last five in all competitions has taken all the impetus out of their season.

Look further back and it's now three wins from 10 in the league. That's 13 points from the last 30. Put simply that isn't going to get the job done.

It was a busy January on the transfer front with Morgan Whitaker and George Edmundson arriving on permanent deals while Mark Travers, Kelechi Iheanacho, Ryan Giles and Samuel Iling-Junior signed loan agreements.

Heading out of The Riverside were Isaiah Jones, Micah Hamilton, Matt Clarke, Alex Gilbert, Lukas Engel, Sammy Silvera, Mathew Hoppe and for a club record fee of £22.5 million, top scorer Emmanuel Latte Lath.

So are the club in a stronger position going in to the final 16 games of the season?

Concerns revolve around questions at both ends of the pitch.

Can Iheanacho weigh in with enough goals to justify the decision to let Latte Lath go to Atlanta United and, if not, will Tommy Conway be able to put a sustained run of starts together after his recent injury problems?

Whittaker and Finn Azaz showed signs against Sunderland that the relationship they developed at Plymouth can be rekindled, but behind them is Boro's failure to bring in another central midfielder asking too much of Aidan Morris?

The suspicion remains that Carrick's team lacks the kind of midfield bite and mongrel Championship sides need if they aren't to be bullied out of games they might otherwise win.

Then there's the defence. Boro's attack is the second best in the division but their defence is mid-table. The 39 goals they've conceded leaves them below not just the promotion chasers Leeds United, Burnley, Sunderland and Sheffield United but also Millwall, Bristol City and Stoke City, among others.

Giles should add an attacking threat at left-back but Luke Ayling has struggled on the right and was left badly exposed at times against the Black Cats.

Clarke's departure for Derby leaves Boro with three senior centre-backs in Rav van den Berg, Dael Fry and Edmundson but that's a position which has been dogged by injury problems all season.

It's not beyond the realms of possibility we'll see Jonny Howson or Ayling drafted into the middle of the defence if the injury curse strikes again.

The expectation in August was this was a squad capable of pushing the top two for promotion. Six months of wildly inconsistent results have tested fans' belief to the extent a growing number now fear the play-offs are going to slip out of reach.

If that were to happen the season could only be viewed as a complete failure.

On Monday evening, Carrick told me it was up to his players to write their own story.

By May, we'll know if he's presided over a thrilling adventure or something from the horror section.