Tony Pulis wants to see his side start taking their chances

Tony Pulis hopes that Middlesbrough’s strikers will join the “party” after watching his team fail to find the net as they were held to a goalless draw by Sheffield Wednesday.

The Boro boss was left frustrated at the Riverside again having failed to oversee a home win in the Championship since taking over on Boxing Day.

Middlesbrough, who have fired blanks in four of his five home dates so far, wasted numerous chances and missed out on an opportunity to reduce the gap to the top six to a point.

Pulis said: “It’s disappointing because it is another game where we have played, created six or seven clear-cut chances to score goals where we haven’t.

“That’s three or four games I have been involved in where we have thrown points away, and even against Brighton in the cup.

“The club has invested a lot of money in the forward line this year, the players at this club, we need them to come to the party.

“We look strong enough at the back, we looked creative enough, play good football at times, get lots of crosses into the box, and we get in to that final third a lot.

“We need them to be on the end of things of creating something out of nothing for themselves.

“We bring Britt Assombalonga and Patrick Bamford off and then bring Rudy Gestede and Martin Braithwaite on. There’s a hell of a lot of money that Steve Gibson has invested in this group of players and we need them to score goals.”

Middlesbrough secured the signing of England Under-21 international Jack Harrison on loan from Manchester City before the game, with City happy for him to head straight out after making his £4m move from New York City.

Pulis will not be looking to do too much other business before the transfer window closes, despite links with Everton’s Mo Besic and possible player departures.

He said: “The club have invested a lot in this squad so to ask for money to change things is not fair, even if I think it is necessary.

“I don’t think that’s right. We have to understand that. Fingers crossed we have enough, whether it is through luck or whatever, let’s hope they start scoring.

“There’s 24 hours to go, I have been in the game so long if I say no and something comes up, then I don’t want to tell any lies or pre-empt anything. We will see.”

Sheffield Wednesday boss Jos Luhukay was more satisfied with the outcome on Teesside – even if it was the third league game in a row since he took over that the Owls recorded a goalless draw.

The Dutchman said: “I think we had problems in the beginning for the first ten minutes on the left side, we had a problem with Adama Traore and his speed.

“After ten minutes we came into the game better. We played good football and good combinations. We didn’t make the good decisions in the final 30 metres and that was our problem in the first half.

“In the second half we lost the ball too much. We had three or four situations where Middlesbrough could have scored. We have to live with this draw and now recover and try to win our next home game on Saturday. We didn’t create many chances.”